Seeing with new eyes

It's interesting, how when you've watched something your whole life, you become completely desensitized to it.
One thing I noticed recently, when I was watching Bambi.

It's the scene just after the "Great Prince" appeared for the first time, and walked through the field full of deer. And then he stops and the ominous music starts.
We never see anything. We don't know what's going on. We just know that all the deer start running in fear, and Bambi is panicking because he can't find his mom, and he doesn't know what's happening either.
And then just as they escape, there's a gunshot.

I'd seen the scene so many times. But suddenly this last time, I felt like I was seeing it for the first time. It is a really powerful scene, and I never even noticed.



I should try to watch and read things like that more often. Otherwise everything is just dull and repetitive. Especially since I've seen a lot of my favorite movies over and over.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, everyone!
I hope you all had a wonderful time with your family today~
And that you ate good food and got cool loot XD

I'm going up to Portland the day after tomorrow. I've been trying to finish up a bunch of projects before I leave (I made a bunch of quilted hearts to bring to Oregon! I also want to finish a pony order before I leave, if I can).
I'll bring some writing projects when I go. I think I'll probably work on editing Katani's story again, so I can take a break from Ashes and get some distance between it.
I haven't looked at Katani in a while, so hopefully I'll be able to look at it with fairly fresh eyes.

New and Improved Character Development Sheet!

A long time ago, I had a little character interview sheet that I made by blending questions from a few different sources. I posted it on the blog, using Katani as an example.
A few months ago, I started putting together an even bigger one. I added more to the interview, but mostly there are several pages of questions about charaters. The interview gets into the voice of the character. The rest of the questions are just information. 'I got the questions from several different sources, and I made up some myself.
Some of the questions are harder to answer, simply because the answer may change throughout the course of the story, and it's hard to pick a certain time to focus on. You could include all of them, I suppose. Other questions are tricky because you could either apply them to the real world, or the world that the character lives in. For example, Katani's world doesn't have movies. So I gave him one from this world. And I've given him some books from his world to like, but I also had ideas for books from this world that he would enjoy.
I just finished filling it out for Katani. It took a realllly long time... I neglected it for a few months during school even.

And now I really need to do it for Ashlyn. I don't have a good sense of her.
Sigh. It always seems to be the main character... Both Katani and Ashlyn. --_--
Although I've got Katani down better~
Now it's Ashlyn's turn!
We'll see hos long it takes to fill out this sheet fore her...

Into the Ashes, Out of the Ashes

Whoo, I think I did it, you guys!
I finished my first draft of my Ashes story!
At about 12:00 AM sharp. :3

It's only 90 pages long. Heheh.
That's because I skipped huge hunks of plot. I had no ideas about them as I wrote. I think I mentioned earlier that after a certain point, I had no idea how to fill most of the story.
So the second half is incredible bare.
But as I wrote, I thought of ways to fill it in!
So my second draft will probably be about twice as long as this (Well, maybe not quite that much. But many more chapters will be added).

I've rewritten the first four chapters already, for creative writing.
Although I'm probably going to have to add an entire chapter in there. To show the world and the peopel in Ashlyn's life.
And last night I read one of my chapters at my creative writing class. It was the last class of the semester there.
I read the chapter about Ashlyn's first encounter with a wild dog. It's the first chapter I ever wrote. And I've brought it to several different classes and rewritten it probably about five times. It's also what I used to try to get into my grad program. XD So I guess it worked.
The class liked it, so that's good. Considering how many times I've edited it.

And now... I must sleep. @__@

Recognizable, or predictable?

I've noticed something.
I seem to be very predictable. Either that, or very recognizable.

For example, a couple years ago I went to visit my old high school on Halloween. I wore my hooded cloak and wolf mask. And over half of my old teachers could tell who I was... With me completely covered up! It's not like I've had classes with them recently (not for a few years).

And when I went to give my talk at the ranch, I saw Robin up the hill right after I arrived. She was probably about 50 feet away, but she could tell who I was immediately.

And then I called up the video store we often go to. The guy who runs it knows my dad and uncle. I called up to ask about a movie, but didn't tell him my name. And he still knew it was me. XP

So I wonder what it is that makes me so recognizable, even for people I only see a couple times a year...
It's kinda funny though.

Performance Joys

A while ago, I ran onto this music video from the How To Train Your Dragon 2 soundtrack.



I liked the song, but I also liked the performance of the singer. He's fun to watch, because he looks like he's having so much fun.
And then Nicole said that he won this big contest in Europe. Let me look for the video...



And he still looks like he's having fun.
I've seen a lot of really good performances, but even if the performers were unbelievably good, they rarely look like they're enjoying themselves.
Maybe it's just like a job to them. Or maybe they're nervous. Or they could be enjoying themselves, but don't necessarily have a big smile while doing so.
I want to start looking for this more when I watch concerts and such. It makes a performance that much more exciting, when the performer is really into it.
I've gotta keep that in mind for myself too. Though admittedly playing flute is almost impossible to do if you're grinning.

Winter Freeedom~

I had my only final today, which was very easy. ^-^
So now I'm pretty much freeee for the holidays.
Though of course I need to keep working on my project, and communicating with teachers and reading some research stuff. But at least I'm doe with my comute~

Big Summer Snags

So, over the summer, there was one week in particular where it seemed like my college was trying to sabotage me. There were three big things that happened one after another (there may have been four, but I can't remember the fourth, which is probably a good thing. Maybe I couldn't get into some classes I needed).

My main adviser said he had to stop being my main adviser. I later discovered that this was because he was promoted to head of a department, but he didn't tell me that at the time.
Then an English teacher who I was hoping to have as an adviser said he wouldn't do it. He was too busy.
And third, one of my teachers gave me an incomplete. She never told me about it. If I hadn't stumbled across that "I" on the school website, I would never have even known about it, and not done anything until much later. She has absolutely no reason to give me an "I." She had weeks to give me the changes she wanted to make to my project, and she never gave them to me. Not until I emailed her more than once, asking why I got an incomplete. She told me that she wanted me to change my project.
So I did. I think I got it back to her in a week. And it took her an entire semester to do anything about it. I was stuck with an incomplete almost this entire semester.

Because she gave me an incomplete, I couldn't submit my project plan to the school.
And because I couldn't submit my project plan, one of my classes may have been in jeopardy.
I emailed her several times, over several months. I rarely got any response. And when she did respond, she kept saying she'd work on it. Finally I had to go into her office and talk to her. Now I knew this teacher from before. I had gotten along very well with her so this behavior was a lot more frustrating that it would have been if I didn't know her. And it was even more frustrating that she as very subtly implying that she didn't think my project was going to fly.
It was only a month ago that she finally changed my grade.
I think she just doesn't like my project idea. That's probably why she didn't make my grade higher. It wasn't a bad grade, but I'm certain I deserved higher.
So, yes. Frustrating.

Those three big things all happened within a week. It was very hard to fight the stress of all that, especially over vacation.
But I managed to get through the first two problems after some emails. And the third problem was only completely finalized yesterday, when the school approved my plan (the plan that I couldn't submit for several months because my teacher hadn't graded my class).

Is there a moral here? Yes. I could have panicked that week, and gotten all depressed during my free summer. Instead I managed to keep it together. And I managed to get everything fixed, without any negative consequences (except for delays and the fear of consequences).
Moral #2: If you're a teacher, don't screw your students.

Don't worry about hurdles, guys. You'll get through them. I believe in you!

Pink Toes

Here's a fun project.
Find something that you're not allowed to touch, but that you'd really like to touch. Take a picture of it, and tell us about it.



Cat toes. They look so squishy and fun to play with. Especially these adorable pink ones.
Unfortunately if you try to play with them, you often end up being chewed on by the owner of the toes.



#theartassignment

Mini Nanowrimo

So I guess our mini Nanowrimo ended a couple days ago.
How did you guys do? (Did you get anything done? O__O )
Mine went pretty well. I got close to the end of my first draft. I probably could have finished, but I didn't work as long on it as I should because my project felt kinda short XP. I guess I kept tlling myuself "oh, I'll have time."
Plus I got a Wii U... that doesn't help at all for conserving time...

I'm glad I'm almost done with draft #1. Although the next draft will probably be about twice as long as this. As I worked, I thought of plenty of ways to flesh out the second half of my story. Which is great. That's what I hoped for. But this first draft is very much a skeleton. Poor thing.
So now I've gotta finish up the draft. I have a slightly stronger idea of the climax now~

Never a Dull Moment

You know, every now and then I'm afraid I'll run out of ideas for my blog.
I always aim for at least 10 posts a month. Sometimes I forget and miss one, and then I'm very sad to see that a month only has 9 posts. XP

But I've had this blog going for 7 years.
Holy crud... has it really been that long? O__O
And I haven't run out of ideas yet!
It seems that I get ideas all at once for posts, and I write them all down so I don't forget. I just got several more ideas, so I'll slowly post those over the next few weeks.

Also, I still have my list for the "Environmental plots" section. I'll have to start working on one of those again.

Family Crest

I thought I'd post this.
We have a family crest!




And a saying for the camily too.
"Brave in Difficulty"

I looked up some more pictures of the crest, and it seems that half of them have the colors of the lions and the background inverted. So I'm not sure what the differences in them mean.
But I want to draw our three lions now...
And I wonder if any other sections of my family have a crest. Hmmm.

Making FIRE

This weekend I went to a program where I learned how to make fire. Without matches or a lighter or anything.
It was so exciting! There were about ten people in the class, and everyone was so thrilled the first time they were able to blow their tinder into flame.
We used a bow drill.

It doesn't seem like it would be hard.
It is.
Rubbing two sticks together will not give you fire.
There are so many different factors - the type of wood, the hardness of each piece of wood, the way each piece is carved, the friction for each piece, how hard you press, how wide and deep the notch is.
the first day, we practiced with the kits the teachers brought. Even that is tricky. You need to brace your foot over the board, and kneel at the right angles with your legs and feet. You also need to make long strokes, keeping your hand parallel to the ground (it's a lot easier with two people). At first I was pressing too hard. And then the handhold wasn't waxed, so too much friction was going up there. And then it turned out that my board was too hard of wood.
It's really easy to get smoke. It's hard to get a coal. Once you get a coal started, you need to take it very slowly to let the coal stick. And then you wrap it up in its little nest and keep blowing until it ignites.
It probably took me ten tries the first time.
And then everyone howls and goes "FIRE!"

Yesterday - the second day - we all made our own fire kits. We didn't gather our own materials. That would make everything much harder than it already was. We did gather our own bow and we carved everything out.
I was the first one to finish and get fire.
For my second fire, I built it up and we kept it going as other people added their flames to it. It was still going by the time I left. It was like my baby. XD

Always pray to the fire spirits, and thank them for their lovely fire~

I started 3 fires - one the first day, and then two yesterday, on my own kit.
This kind of stuff will be great for my stories. We also learned to make cordage, which is great because that's the kind of stuff Katani likes to do . Now I know how it works~

A long time ago, I wrote about this book called Tracker, by Tom Brown Jr. As a kid, he was taught everything by a Native American shaman. That first book actually gave me some great ideas for my Ashes story. I'm reading another of his books now, and there are several others (I want to read them all). He has a survival school in New Jersey, and our two teachers were his students.
I really want to go to that school... his books are amazing.

Personal NaNoWriMo

The NaNoWriMo is infamous among amateur writers. Simply put it's the National Novel Writing Month.

The rules are as follows:

- Write one 50,000 word (or longer!) novel, between November 1 and November 30.
- Start from scratch. None of your previously written prose can be included in your NaNoWriMo draft (though outlines, character sketches, and research are all fine, as are citations from other people's works). While this is no longer a hard-and-fast rule, it is still very strongly recommended, ESPECIALLY for first timers.
- Write a novel. We define a novel as a lengthy work of fiction. If you consider the book you're writing a novel, we consider it a novel too!
- Write more than one word repeated 50,000 times.
- Upload your novel for word-count validation to our site between November 25 and November 30.

Now I don't know about anyone else, but I have a life (or at least I pretend to have one) and I don't really have time to write 50,000 words in a month; especially since I'm very particular about my own work. Not only that, but 50,000 words is a lot for a hobbyist who isn't all that invested in getting into writing as a career.

But as one kind person who understands lazy people like me wrote, "But you can rebel and you can do your own thing!" And thank goodness for that. So a few friends and I decided to rebel in the most rebellious way we could while still keeping the idea of NaNoWriMo intact.

We decided our own goals for the month: write a complete chapter, write some amount of words a week, write anything, etc.

Then we decided on a date to send our work for the week to everyone via email and a date to send out feedback on everyone else's work.

After that we decided what we wanted the others to pay attention to. For me I wanted my betas to pay attention to character interactions, believability of the world, and the believable integrations of characters into this world, plus grammar and spelling.

Then we started writing. Simple, no? We removed the novel part of the NaNoWriMo as well. Mine will eventually turn into a videogame with multiple branching storylines (or just a comic, we'll see). The weekly check-ins and feedback are really useful and it's nice to discuss how to tackle certain problems and see the results. That and I get some great ideas for character interaction by talking with everyone.

It may not be the NaNoWriMo that everyone is accustomed to, but hey it works for me. I'm even thinking that maybe I should just do it all the time. I get to work at my own pace and I don't need a billion words by the weekly turn in date. For the first turn in day I submitted a few pages of notes about the world!

I like how it doesn't demand my full attention constantly and it's easy to go and deal with all that life has to throw at me.

So here's my question to anyone reading this out there.

What are your writing goals?
What do you want your audience to get out of your work?
What do you want your betas (editors, whoever) to pay particular attention to when they read your work?

My First Craft Fair

Okay, so last year Mom took some of my craft stuff to this little craft fair, but this was the very first time I got to go to a fair to sell my stuff!
I was fun~
There were maybe about 15 booths, and it went for an hour. I also knew several of the people, since it was through Ananda. I think since it was a small craft fair, it was a lot more easy-gong than a big one, which made it less tiring and more fun.
It's fun seeing the other booths! I didn't get anything but Mom got some stuff.

I made some new things for the craft fair and pulled out a ton of stuff that had been sitting around for a while. Mom also added a few things she had crocheted.

I printed out a few little "business card" things. And then I didn't hand them out to people, so I still have most of them. >o< It's nice actually being able to interact with the people who like my stuff. Almost everything else I've sold has been online. I sold 9 things. And 3 people asked to reserve things before the show even started. This one little boy hung around for about 10 minutes, obviously wanting to get some stones that Mom had in little packets. He did get a stuffed cat I made, so that his stuffed dog could chase it XD. He kept asking why everything cost so much. There were a couple things that I was really hoping to sell, and both of them were taken! So I'm glad that they found a nice home. The poor teddy bear is still stuck here though. I guess there are too many teddy bears floating around. I put a bunch of the remaining plushies in Etsy, so maybe they can find homes there.

Now I gotta finish a couple commissions.

The lull

Well, I have officially reached the part of my story beyond which I don't know much. All of the solid ideas I had have passed. And ahead is just a muddy blur, with a vague end point.
So, I'm going to plod along and see what happens. Last night I hit a little burst of ideas, so I hope they keep coming.

By the way, I don't think anyone mentioned the nanowrimo-esque thing.
Will one of you guys write a post about it? Since it was your idea originally?
(Desperately trying to bring other writers back to the blog @_@ )
My November project is to try to finish my rough draft of Ashes.

So, I will go and continue writing through my muddy pit and see if anything happens in the next hour.

Recommended Books

Whoo, I finally finished!
These are two posts that i've beebn slowly building off of as I find new books or movies to recommend.
To Watch
References for Writers


The first one is entertainment, mostly. Books, movies, shows, anime, manga, games, ex.
The second one is mostly research stuff. Websites and books, and stuff about writing.

There is a bit of overlap between the subjects. And some of them could possibly get switched, but I'm tired of messing around with these lists. XP
Both posts are listed under the links heading of the sidebar.

I recently realized that I didn't really list most of my reference books, about horses, or Chinese gardens, or art, ex. So I've been slowly adding those to my lists.
And I finally finished, with my stack of horse books. ^-^' I have a lot of those from when I used to go riding a lot...
I want to go riding more. TT^TT

Big Hero Six

So, we went and saw Big Hero Six today.
I think there were things that I wanted to say about it... but I can't remember any of them. Xd
IT WAS AWESOME!
I don't think I've ever been in a theater with so much laughing. ^-^
Baymax was so funny, just about every time he appeared.
All the characters were fun.

Maaaaaan, after watching this, I reallly need to work on my furure world for my Ashes story. The world in the movie was so awesome...

Ashlyn Reading 2

On Thursday, I read chapters 2 and 3 of my Ashes story (My grad project).
I should think of a better way of differentiating my 2 creative writing classes... Anyway, this was the smaller class that I'm taking on the side.
One of the girls in my class was really excited to read more of my story, so I hope she liked these chapters. XD
I also realized that I've gotta do a lot more work on developing the future world. Their technology, and their transportation, ex. It takes place about 50 years in the future. And I purposefully didn't change certain aspects of life. But that doesn't mean that I shouldn't work on them. @_@
Although some of it has to do with the fact that Ashlyn doesn't experience a lot of things during the first 2 chapters.
And some of it has to do with me just not adding in details that I had in the side of my head.
I designed some new technology for them, at least.
I think I have a better idea of how to incorporate the back story too.

Why, bikes? Why?

I wonder why people on bikes can be such jerks.
I can kind of understand why they might be mean to people in cars, because people in cars may sometimes be jerks to people on bikes.
But that's not always true.
And it also doesn't explain why people on bikes can also be jerks to other people on bikes.
So, what is it? Do they feel special because they have fancy road racers and riding suits?

To Teach a Class

So, my class that I taught on Wednesday went well.
I've given plenty of presentations to my classmates, but this is the first time I gave an official talk to younger students.
Originally, I was told there would be 45 students, but there were apparently 10 more than that. They were in 7th and 8th grade.
They listened very well at first, to my intro, and when I read my story. They seemed to like my story, so that's good. But because I asked them a lot of questions, they'd chatter a lot during them and I'd need to quiet them down (For example, as I listed some environmental fiction, I mentioned Wall-E. Someone made a Wall-E noise, and I asked if anyone else could to it. That opened up a chorus of "Wall-E"'s, which was hard to quiet. That was the first and most interesting one XD). Which is to be expected, I'm sure. It was a long lesson, and they probably wanted to go do more stuff around the ranch.

As an activity, I asked them each to design a story, or part of a story.
Some of the ideas they shared were very cool. Others just came up to share to be weird, or to get attention. Again, that's to be expected. It was kinda funny though. I asked if they had any questions about the environment, and one girl asked if we could milk chickens. Leslie, the director of the ranch seemed pretty shocked about that, apparently thinking the girl's question was serious. It wasn't.
I tried to record the lesson, but I was dumb enough to leave my recorder on the picnic bench, so I probably got very little of my speech, and a lot of the kids talking and whispering. Heheh.
Robin took a lot of pictures for me. I haven't even looked at them yet, come to think of it...
Hopefully the kids had fun during some of it. I'd have liked to have kept it shorter, to fit their attention spans (the whole thing, with story, talk, activity, and sharing was pretty long). But partly my lesson needed to be a certain length, and a lot more people wanted to share. Which is great, but I think the sharing started making some of the others bored. XD
So, yaay~ That took a lot of planning, since I went so much earlier than the rest of my class. So it's nice to get that big project out of the way.

Teacher Teacher

Tomorrow I'm going to teach an actual class to actual middle school students. About 50 of them, I think.
I hope I'll be able to get them all involved in the lesson without overwhelming myself. XD
I have to teach a class as a project for my Environmental Education class, so I asked the ranch I volunter at. Luckily they had a group of students coming in, that's the age range I was hoping for. It's a lot earlier that most of my classmates will be teaching, but that means I don't have to worry about it later. Tomorrow I'm going down to the ranch for this class.
I'll talk about environmental fiction (books and movies) and I'll also read a short story I wrote. It's actually based of fof the Katani story (~10 years before). It's about when Shanka was a little girl, and how the riot started. It's 2 pages long, so it doesn't talke too long to read. But hopefully it will still be an effective example.
I think it'll be fun. I'll let you know how it goes!

Do they Count as Short Stories?

We discussed my "romance" short story on Tuesday. I kept forgetting to write about it, probably because there wasn't anything very memorable about that class XP.
I got a lot of very conflicting suggestions from class. One person said the characters were great, another said they should be developed more. One said my setting was great, and another said it needed work. So on. There didn't seem to be much agreement. I only got a couple helpful comments from my teacher. Most of them were just the same stuff that I knew already.
And I think it's because all of my stupid "short stories" are based off of larger works. I do my best to "hint at a larger world." But half the students in the class think that it means everything is undeveloped, or something? The other half of the students doesn't seem bothered by it.
I could add more detail about the existing stories/worlds, but then the short story would no longer be short, and there would be a lot of boring explanation that isn't really needed for that specific piece. Plus I don't particularly want to re-write a bunch of stuff for no reason.
The obvious solution would be to not turn in anymore short stories that are based off of longer works. Except I don't have any ideas that are short enough to turn in. Plus, I'm done turning in stories for this class. Each person only does 2.

Now I'm not sure what to do with this "romance chapter" either (I don't know what else to call it... Is it even a romance?)
Dad seems the only person, or at least the only person I heard from, who seemed to read the story as I intended it to be read.
Other people thought that Fei Yen was just going along with it because she felt like she had to.
So... that's unfortunate. I hope that's something I can fix.
The beginning also needs work. Which isn't surprising, since that's where I was trying to include all of the scattered bits of info from Katani's story, in order to set up this scene. So... I could got a couple different directions with editing that.
I'm kinda torn. I kinda want to bury this story for a really long time, and just keep it in my head as the perfect scene.
But I suppose there's also the possibility of taking it on as the last chapter of Katani's story. I'm not sure what to think about that yet... It might tie up that part of the story very nicely. But it would also change the ending, in a direction that I didn't originally intend.
So who knows.
At least I don't have any other romantic stuff to write XP.
Now I can go back to working on my grad program story. I've got to fix up a few more chapters of that to read at my OTHER creative writing class.
@_@

Warped

I seem to have a very odd sense for some characters...
For example, during most of the romantic scenes during Once Upon a Time, I end up laughing a lot. There's nothign wrong with the scenes. I think it has more to do with the characters, and me failing to imagine them in any sort of romantic scene.
But either way, I think there's something wrong with me. XD Since I don't think it's normal to laugh during most romantic scenes.
By the way, the new season of Once Upon a TIme. I love how they did Christophe and Anna (Especially when Christophe says "You didn't think to check if there was anyone in there before you used it?" XD. And I love that Christophe and Elsa actually get to interact with eah other. And Elsa has a big role~

And anyway, part two. I've noticed an odd trend when I start getting attached to characters that I wasn't previously attached to. it's when they start to remind me of a puppy.
I don't even know how that works. But something in my head goes, "aww, look at him! He's like a puppy~"

Yeah, I think something's wrong with me...
XD
XD
XD

Revelation

So, I was reading one of the books from the same series as the Da Vinci Code. And when we got near the end of the book, they finally started to reveal the identity of the villain. And I realized who he was moments before they actually told us.
That right there is some genius writing: to help the reader come to a realization moments before they actually give the answer to you. The timing of the clues has to be absolutely perfect.
If you figure out the mystery too soon, then the suspense isn't there for half of the book.
But it makes the reader feel so clever if they can figure it out for themselves too.
Although some writers don't want you to know until the answer until they can give you the dramatic reveal. And shock factor can be exciting too. I remember the first time I read Harry Potter, near the end of the first book. We got to the point where Harry reached the end of the obstacles before on the way to the mirror, and the chapter ended just before telling us who Voldemort's servant was. I couldn't wait, and had to flip to the next page, just to find out. That was a long time ago, but I certainly didn't guess who it was.
This can sometimes backfire if it's not done well though (For example, Amon in Legend of Korra. I was convinced that he was we'd met him before, but he ended up being some totally mysterious person who we couldn't possibly know about).

Fail early

In response to Tara's latest post I thought I'd talk about something we covered in my own class.  Although my thing has more to do about videogames and playtesting I feel like it could easily be related to writing, art, or anything else that can be put up for critique. (and honestly what isn't put up for critique these days?)

I angst over putting out our work for the world to look at. There are a lot of things that discourage me from showing my work.

For me it usually boils down to the "it's not done yet." There's something that's not quite right, or I need to evoke more emotions from this one scene, or it's not how it looks in my head, there's a minor bug in the code, whatever.  So by the time I actually do decide to show my work to people I'm already fed up with it and never want to look at it again. (A big apology to all my artwork that I gave up on)

It's a big hurdle, putting your soul into something but being able to leave that "it's my baby!" attitude out.

Sure it's easy to get defensive,or try to explain why something is the way it is, or why it's not there at all. Maybe you didn't get around to it. Maybe it didn't work. Maybe it works better that way. We all know that not everybody is going to love our work. It'd be nice, but it's just not statistically possible.

Still feedback is feedback. Someone is taking the time to go over your work, to look at it, read it, play it, listen to it, what have you. Someone is actively paying attention to your baby. It doesn't matter if they tell you that your baby is the ugliest baby in the world if you know it's actually a pretty decent looking baby. (And it's what's on the inside that counts, right?)

Fixing stuff is great, if it makes it better. I can't even begin to describe how many times I've been working on a program, think I've fixed a bug and twenty thousand new bugs crop up. Remember fix stuff so it's better, not worse.

Not talking is a great way to see your tester (or reader) in their natural habitat. Watching and observing them is great too. This may be harder for things like artwork, but for games and stories you can definitely catch when people laugh or frown or look super confused.  If they're confused enough to ask you something, then something is wrong. Think about it like you're giving them a new microwave without a manual. It should be intuitive but if they need to look it up in the manual (you, the creator) something is wrong.

Oddly enough, for games players tend to offer solutions rather than telling you the underlying problems, but for stories people tend to tell you something is wrong rather than giving you a potential solution. Interesting, huh?

The last thing I do when I'm working on something is generally the hardest thing for me to do. I walk away for awhile (this is the easy part) then I come back and try to go through my project like I'm brand new to it. We develop bias and get used to certain things after a time with our developed knowledge of what's going on.  So we tend to skip over certain areas that we think are fine and don't need fixing. Go back read it like you've never read it before (like you're brand new to it). Spellchecker is your friend but it can't catch everything.

Also I really liked this blog called Terrible Minds. It's by a writer for writers. The author is amusing and brutally honest.

Terrible Minds: A Post about Editing
Terrible Minds: 25 Steps to Edit the Unmerciful Suck out of your story

Just Listen

During many of my creative writing classes, when the class is discussing a story, the writer is discouraged from talking too much.
Admittedly, this can be annoying if you just need to clarify one thing (so not all the comments are about the same topic). But the reason for this is understandable. You as a writer don't need to justify everything that people disagree with. Just listen to the advice. And some of it may be bad advice. But most of the comments well help you learn something. Even if you only need to switch a word to make an idea clearer.

But it's really annoying when the class is commenting on an author's work, and they have to go on this long justification every time someone gives a suggestion...
(I may do that sometimes, but usually I try to mostly listen).

*****

I read one of my poems in class last night. It got five stars. ^-^
The first semester of the class, you turn in a poem almost every week. But in the following semesters, I focused on fiction, so poetry was optional.
That first semester though, I wrote one, maybe two poems that earned five stars.
I only turned in a couple poems last time I took the class. And this was my first poem this semester. I do want to write a couple more though. One about Alaska. TT^TT
And one about a weird pair of shoes that I used to have, based off a prompt the teacher gave us yesterday.

Anyway, his poem was based off of elves. I've been reading a book of Irish folk tales recently, and decided to write a poem about elves calling out to children to come and play.

Rush @__@

Wow, this is something that I didn't know could happen!
Jeez, the power of writing!
There have been many times where I have written very intense part of my stories and gotten really excited and worked up as I wrote and lived the scene in my head (Especially the assassin scene in Red Seeker - that's the one that's been getting me a lot recently, even as I think back on it. Whoo, rush!)
It really is an awesome sensation. I love writing exciting parts because of that.
I didn't really expect that this time. Because this scene I'm writing for my creative writing class doesn't have much action in it.
This is a scene from Red Seeker too. Well, not actually. It takes place a couple weeks after the end of the story.
The beginning touches a ceremony in which Katani and his friends show up briefly, as do Shanka and the Betas. But the story is Fei Yen's.
Hmm. Does this count as spoilers for my story? Well, everyone here probably knows about this, but you have been warned.
This is the scene where Kazuhi proposes to Fei Yen.
I got the idea for the scene a couple months ago, maybe. And since I don't have many short story ideas, I thought I'd use it as my second creative writing story (The one at my main school, not the one I take for fun at the smaller college near my house). I just finished the first draft a couple minutes before I wrote this post.
I started getting very excited about this story a while ago. Especially when I got new ideas for it.
Now I tried to write a romantic scene once a few years ago. I haven't looked at it since, and I don't particularly want to look at it again. I don't really read romance, and I certainly don't write it. I've never been in love or in a relationship or anything, so I don't even have anything to compare it to. So I don't know how good the scene will be written out in the end.
But the scene feels so great in my head. I love Kazuhi and Fei Yen so much. I've heard that authors should be careful about getting so attached to their characters, but I can't help it. I really love these two guys (to be fair, I love everyone else in the story, but these two gotta be my favorites).

I got a major rush writing the last part of this scene. Although I have absolutely zero romantic experience, as I wrote this scene, I could feel it completely. Wow. I had no idea writing could do that. For all the times I've gotten energy rushes from writing, I didn't know that it could actually let you "feel" a romance even if you don't know what romance is like. It's like a whole new experience.
Does this even make sense? I feel as un-eloquent as Fei Yen was during that scene. XD

Wish me luck in editing. I really want to make this scene worth it.

Animation

I recently watched a video about the staff that did the visual effects to Life of Pi. Which was an awesome movie.
But the story of what happened to the animation staff was not awesome. And unfortunately, it is not an uncommon story for animators.



Animation can really bring movies to life. And because of special effects, it's used now more than ever. It's not only limited to cartoons.
Cartoons, on the other hand, don't seem to be doing too hot...
I heard that Disney actually demolished their cartoon staff, in favor of digital animation. Which sounds awful. All those talented artists, kicked out. I don't know anything about digital animation, but it must be completely different from drawing cartoons.
And animation can be a really hard field for new students coming in.

Cartoonists seem to have a really tough time of it. When I read Starting Point, by Miyazaki, it talked a lot about how the artists who worked in the studios were intensely overworked. Some of the staff have to stay after hours all the time, and sometimes work into the night. And then when the season is finally done, it's time to start a new one.

And animation just doesn't seem to get noticed by a lot of people.
I mentioned in a previous post about how the people who judged the Oscars didn't seem to care about the category of best animated picture.

The Wind Rises went mostly unnoticed, even though it was so beautiful and inspiring.

And then I found this~

CHAOS HAIR!

So, we each started designing characters based off of a fancy-colored wig.
And I decided to do this for a character that I'd already thought of, but had not yet given an appearance (or name) to.
And I came up with Mikeya.



She is actually on the team that represents chaos. The other main character in the story is on the team that represents order. They will be a very interesting pair to write, considering how poorly they get along. ^-^ It'll be fun though. Poor guy. Mikeya will probably drive him crazy. And he has to deal with her a lot too.
I have some very distinct scenes for this story, but not much beyond a very basic plot. It takes place on Magic-Earth, and will probably be a project for the far future. Although I occasionally come up with ideas for it (Like I did when I started thinking about Mikeya. I didn't really know anything about her before this).

Landmark #2

Whoo, so I finally wrote up to the second big landmark of the story - the event that forces Ashlyn to return to her old hometown.
And I just realized something. I've finished a large part of the story already (I don't know what percentage, but maybe at least 1/3) and I haven't even mentioned the two other main characters. And I have no idea how to do that until Ashlyn meets them...
Hmm. I could do some chapters from their POV, but it doesn't seem like that would fit.
Although I think I have to have one from Lucas.
Hmmmm.

Good Stress Bad Stress

So, I recently watched a bunch of Ted Talks. I definitely recommend looking through them, because they cover a lot of fascinating topics.

One of them got me thinking. (Though I haven't seen it in a while, so I'll try to fill it in as best as I can @_@ )
The woman was talking about exercise, and getting in shape. She talked about how stress can actually prevent you from getting in shape (which probably goes back to survival - your body doesn't want to lose too much weight if there's stressful stuff going on?). And building off of that, doing exercises that are stressful might not actually help you get in shape. For example, running if running isn't fun for you.
In contrast to that, doing relaxing stuff, such as tai chi, or yoga, can help you lose weight. I guess the lack of stress lets your body release extra weight that it might otherwise store during stressful times.

Then during another Ted Talk, they talked about stress. In one study, they found that STRESS IS ONLY DANGEROUS IF YOU THINK IT IS. If you believe that stress will make your body break down and lead to health problems, then it may do exactly that.
But, if you believe that stress just gives your body an extra burst of energy during tough situations, then it's not bad for you. For example, getting pumped during a stage performance (this is one I need to work on - I still freak out for flute solos).
Belief is incredibly powerful this way. I've been reading a lot about it recently. It's pretty awesome. You should try it~

So, I started thinking about these two things. And I came up with this theory.
If you really don't like running, or some exercise, but you do it anyway to get in shape, it might not help that much (because of the bad stress).
BUT if you run because you enjoy it, or you do activities that you enjoy, you will probably not be as stressed. If you enjoy yourself while exercising, it could be better for you.
So, either do stuff you find fun, or find ways to make exercise fun.
You could go the Yowamushi Pedal route, where you sing during the hardest parts of a race.

Sometimes you see people working out with a look of intense anguish on their face. I wouldn't recommend that. It probably makes you really unexcited about working out. Like how my flute teacher told me not to squint my eyes shut when I played weird high notes.
Or you could watch the other people walking around you and laugh at the cute kids (laughing and smiling can do a lot by itself).
Enjoy the scenery.
Or if you're running, pretend like you're Pocahontas, "Eagle help my feet to fly" or Dash, or Quicksilver (Don't stomp when you run, but be light and springy on your feet).
Let yourself relax while you're jogging along, or climbing a rock wall or biking up a steep hill.

So, go out and make sure to have fun~

The Epic Farewell to Candlestick Park

So, I'm finally writing about the Paul McCartney concert in greater detail.
I kept forgetting to come back to it. XD But now I get to remember it all over again~
So, the traffic was bad and it took a long time to get there. And Dad and I were seated in the very farthest back and highest row. But the wall gave us a wind buffer. Heheh. And we had a good view of the rest of the stadium. I took videos of a lot of the concert.
The concert started late. They had electric banners playing around the stage, and music too. Every time a song faded, people cheered, hoping that Paul was about to come out. But Paul finally entered with a few other people for his band. They started out with Eight Days a Week.



I recognized a lot of the songs, but there were some he wrote after the Beatles that I didn't know as much. Ones I knew were Paperback Writer, I love Her, Blackbird, ex. For Paperback Writer, he used the guitar that he used during the original album.
After a while, Dad and I went out to get nachos. And beyond the parking lot was a solid line of cars, stuck on the road and trying to park. Apparently most of them never even made it in (because a bunch of people camped out in the parking lot, to listen to the show outside even though they didn't have tickets. So there wasn't enough parking room for everyone who had actually paid for tickets). I'm so glad we got there really early.
(There was a lot of smoking - and I don't mean tobacco, and drinking too probably. But everyone inside the stadium was really happy).



Dad and I moved a little closer for a while, until someone came and took the seats we were "borrowing."
Lady Madonna, All Together Now, Lovely Rita Meter Maid, All the Lonely People, Benefit of Mr. Kite.
He got out a Ukulele and played Something.
Everyone started singing Ob La Di-Ob La Da. Dad did too. He enjoyed himself a lot. So did I, of course.
Before playing Back in the USSR, he talked about how they were the first rock band that was allowed to perform in Russia. And how they got to meet some of the Russin government.
For Let It Be, everyone got out their phones and waved them overhead.
Live and Let Die was awesome. They shot fireworks and fireballs out of the stage. Everyone went wild. That was probably my favorite part of the concert.
The stage was so smoky after. Heheh.



And of course everyone sang along with Hey Jude. There were a lot of happy people repeating the "Na na na nanananaaaa Hey Juuude~"
That was theoretically the end of the concert.
Then came the enccores. For the first one, they sang Day Tripper.
Then they left again. And came back for a second encore. And they played Yesterday. Paul tried to leave again, but they didn't let him. He said that we all had to go home eventually. And they did their final songs and departded for the night.

Amazingly Dad and I managed to escape the worst of the exiting traffic. We were both so pumped though. It was awesome.

For lack of a better title

Hm... well it's been a while since I've posted on here. But as per usual, I feel like I must post at least once every now and again. Usually I have nothing to talk about, but I figured that the blog would be a good place to discuss story things.

I've been trying to inhabit the mindspace of a character -specifically Ginger. Here's what I've got so far.

_________________________________________________________

It’s hard knowing I’ll never be the favorite. 

I’ve always known that, but there are times when it hits me harder than most.  Knowing the things I say don’t get through no matter how many times I say it; it’s hard. Trying every day to be something that I’m just not and hoping that maybe it might make me a little better is even harder. 

What I do, what I say, what I think and feel, whenever it’s wrong there’s always someone there to witness it. My efforts go unnoticed, my triumphs are brushed aside or others take the credit. And my failures are enshrined in the temple of things not to do. 

But those very same triumphs are given high praise, and the very same failures are swept away whenever their someone else's. 

I’m capable. I am. I know I am. Others tell me so. I can see it for myself. I am capable. 

But others tell me it’s a lie. And I believe them. I know it's not true, but I believe them. It's easy to believe them. It’s hard to fight it. 

It drains my energy to convince myself that I can do it. It’s exhausting to remind people who I am. That I am me and not my sister. It’s been a long and hard fight every day of my life. And I’m getting tired of it.

 _________________________________________________________

That was my interpretation of Ginger, concerning palace life and always being one-upped by her younger sister. Personally, I think her view of herself and those around her has the potential to be really skewed. It seems like she's making herself the victim, or that she is in fact not very capable even though she thinks she is. 

I suppose you could take her word on the way the castle people treat her, but it seems very one-sided since it's just the one character's point of view. Maybe I need more background info on her to make a convincing map of her thought process. That or she's just really depressed at this particular moment.

Thoughts?

Now I have to get Saleera down on paper.

Today's Reading

So, during my creative writing class (at my main college) we did a workshop with my story today. It was our first workshop, and another guy went too.
It seems that every time I submit a piece to this class (this is the same class I audited a few semesters ago) there is some big misunderstanding that takes up all of the comments. So people are basically just saying everything that I know already...
For example, when I turned in my story about the shadow boy a couple years ago, I accidentally used the word "medieval" instead of "fantasy" during my introduction paragraph (it wasn't part of the story, but just a brief explanation about something that I'd pasted at the beginning of my pages. Half of the comments in class were about how this didn't seem like a medieval world. to the point where the teacher said that people should stop mentioning it over and over... And even more of the written comments talked about it.
Then I turned in my very first pilot chapter of my Ashes story that semester. Since my last description paragraph didn't go too well, I didn't include one this time. And thus I got a million questions about how the disaster occurred, and that this seemed like it was part of something bigger.
I could have negated all of that by saying that this way part of a much bigger story, and that a lack of fuel an energy created the disaster.

So this time I tried to do the explanation paragraph well.
I wrote a piece from another story I have planned. It basically takes one of the main characters and retells the beginning of the story through his POV. Since we were doing a first person story, I thought it would be fun to experiment with his voice and view of things. It parallels the beginning, but is not the entire beginning. And indeed, most people liked his voice and character and everything.
In my explanation paragraph, I mentioned that it was part of a larger story. Except everyone took that to mean that this must be the first chapter of the story. So everyone thought that the narrator was going to change, and that seemed odd. Or they thought that more could be done to set up the beginning of the story.
Except all of those details will be covered in the stupid longer version... Which is why I left out those details. Because I don't want to have everything repeated (Though admittedly that probably wasn't the best idea, regarding this class).
There were only a couple comments that I actually found helpful. Because all the rest of the discussion was about stuff I knew.
Ugh. I should stop submitting pieces based off of other stuff. But those are the only short stories I can think of... all my other ideas are too long. TT^TT

And then I was reading all the comments on the train home. It was basically the same stuff we talked about in class.
But this one guy said that my story was bad because it sounded like it was being told by a kid, and it jumped around.
Well... yeah. It IS told by a kid. And it's SUPPOSED to jump around, because it's told by a kid. Did you even read more than half of it?
Sigh.

I think I know what I want to turn in for my second story. I wonder if I'll run into these same problems though...
Since we're discouraged from talking during the workshop it makes things hard to explain.

Rishi and Menth

I finally finished my lastt Retriever pair!

Rishi and his Earth dragon, Menth.

Whoo, that took a very long time. I'm not quite done though, because I still want to draw the two main teachers with their dragons.

A Still Pond

This is about one of the activities we did in that nature program I went to over the summer.

The first evening, our group went down to the Lotus Lake, and we all sat on the bank with some distance between us. We each had seven pebbles in our hands. Our orders were to focus on the lake. And every time we found our mind wandering, we threw a pebble into the water. The ripples are supposed to symbolize the disturbance in our thoughts.

(This is the pond, near where we were sitting. The really big lotuses were across the lake from us).

Admittedly, I'm not sure if I had the right idea. I did focus on the lake the whole time. I looked at the water, the minnows, the frogs, the lotus flowers, the grass, the bug shells clinging to the grass, and so on. I looked close enough that everything me was fascinating. So, my mind wasn't exactly still, but it didn't go off topic. And I did think about the rocks in my hand a few times, because it's hard to not think of something you're holding. I'm not actually sure if that counted, since the pebbles were from the lake bank.
I'm not positive, but I think I may have been the only person in the group to have not lost any stones. One person seemed surprised that anyone could have any stones left.

In one of Joseph Cornell (Bharat)'s books, they talked about some teachers who were part of a similar program. They were told to look at a tree and raise their hands if their mind strayed. Within a matter of seconds, all of their hands were up.

It's kind of strange how our society seems to make it so difficult for us to focus on things. We can't stay concentrated on what's in front of us without worrying about homework, a meeting, lunch, or a TV show.
And like I said, my mind is hardly calm. My thoughts are all over the place most of the time. I still rather suck at meditating. XP
And I doodle during class a lot. If I didn't have an entire lake to visually explore, I probably wouldn't have kept my stones for very long.
But quieting our mind can really help to let us find solutions to a lot of problems. And get rid of stress and anxiety and such. That's one reason why meditation is supposed to be so helpful. Though for me, meditation just helped me improve my posture a lot...

Beauty and the Beast

I've been watching through some of the Disney Movies recently, and picking out some animals to practice sketching. I want to practice poses and cartoonish stuff. I'm going in alphabetical order, to help me keep track, and I just did Beauty and the Beast.
So, Beauty and the Beast is one of my favorite Disney musicals (Along with Lion King and Pocahontas).
I never had a really strong reason as to why Beauty and the Beast was up there. Except that I knew I liked it. And unsurprisingly, I like Beast a lot. Animal people!! Aren't I predictable?

I wish he had an actual name though...
And it's always bugged me how all those happy people during the "Bonjour" song become so evil at the end...
And I just discovered! That big waltz scene during "Beauty and the Beast" isn't a waltz. Because the music isn't in 3/4 time. Therefore it's not a real walts. They seem to change dances a lot in movies. Like that fake tango you see all over.
Anyway, I was debating about whether or not to do a sketch of Beast, since he's less an animal and more a person, so I figured I'd do a bigger drawing of him eventually.
But I wasn't sure if I would do that bigger drawing, so I decided to do a quick sketch (although now I think maybe I should do a bigger drawing...).
It was hard finding a pose I wanted to draw him in, and I kept going over a couple scenes in slow mo to find a shot I liked. For example, the scene where he's waiting for Belle to come to dinner, and she doesn't so he gets mad and charges upstairs.
And I really started noticing the animation of how he moved. Aaaah! he's such a dog! It's awesome! I never noticed the animation of that scene before, until I went slowly. And I'm also probably desensitized to it since I've seen it so many times.
So, now for some reason I like Beast even more.
And I realized that I would probably make a very horrible "Belle" roll. For one good point, he probably wouldn't scare me with all his roaring. But I wouldn't want him to change back into a human (although I love that transformation scene). Although I guess that' not entirely true. I'd want him to change back into a human if he really wanted to. XP I'm so weird, getting sad because he loses his fur and his tail.
When I was little, was always a bit weirded out by his human form. I like it more now though.

Actually, I've been developing my own version of Beauty and the Beast. Until recently I only had a vague idea of it. But I got some more ideas recently.
I want to go more of the Frozen/Maleficent/Once Upon a Time Route, regarding the "love breaks a curse." It's not romantic love that breaks the curse. Except I probably won't make it as sweet as the aforementioned movies. Because the "Beast" will probably really be in love with the girl. But the girl just loves this beast that she's been with for a while, who watches over her. Poor Beast.
I would say that I don't have very happy romances (Especially with my star character), except I've had this scene in my head for a few days now - where Kazuhi proposes to Fei Yen. I really need to write that. If I pull it off, it will be the only decent romantic thing I've ever written. XP

The Black Rabbit

Since I love Watership Down (book and movie) I drew this.

Watership Down is the reason I got Alaska in the first place.

I think my new drawing pencil is magic though. Ever since I started my new sketchbook (this is the first page of it) I feel a lot better at drawing. XP

School Begins

Today was the first day of class. Though only my creative writing class met.
I've got 2 creative writing classes this semester. Though the one at the community college isn't much work.
I only have 2 classes this semester (besides the 2 at the community college. I guess I have 3, but one of them is just units for forking on my project.
So I must work a lot on it. O__O
Get to work.
Faster.

What's Shakin?

It's bad to go to an anime convention when you've been trying to suppress a spending urge for a couple weeks...

Anyway, I woke up at 3:20 AM last night to a rattling sound.
I don't really remember my initial thoughts, but I quickly realized that it was probably an earthquake. A couple moments later, I was holding Leaf, who had been sleeping at the foot of my bed. I must have grabbed her, wanting to keep her safe.
The rattling continued for several seconds, and then quieted down.

Dad felt it too, though I heard it more than felt it.
I seem to have a very strange thought process around 3:00 AM. Because when I failed to fall easily back to sleep, I thought "Oh! I just moved my statues of Barron and Louise. What if an aftershock comes, and they fall off?"

So I got up and laid them on their sides, so they couldn't tip off of the dresser.
It took a while to fall asleep again.

I'd felt a couple little earthquakes before. The first one I felt was a long time ago. It was so mild that I just thought Midnight had jumped on my bed. Except it went on too long for that.
They were always a bit exciting to me.
This one made me uneasy though.
And for good reason, since this turned out to be the edge of a very large earthquake. Napa really got trashed.
I wish I could go up there to see what I could do. Sigh.

Killing solar

So, Hawaii seems like a good place for solar power, right?
A lot of peopel think so. So much so that the fossil fuel companies are losing a lot of money.
So what do they do? They're making excuses to prevent peopel from installing solar panels. Families will take out loans and start to pay for solar panels, only to be told that they have to wait while "certain possibilities" are examined. As if too much solar energy will blow up the house, or the power plant. And the peopel that have already spent a lot of money are stuck for who known how long.
I don't understand how society has gotten to this point...

Reading Ashes

This evening was the first day of my creative writing class.
I offered to read today, and I ended up being the only one. Heh.
It's kind of sad though, because most of the regulars of the class aren't here anymore... There's only about 5 of us left.
Probably thanks to that stupid rule where you can't repeat classes anymore...
Anyway I read the first chapter of my grad program story. I rewrote it all before I turned it in.
It's kind of funny, because there are people who are a bit new at writing. Since it's the first day of class they were kind of impressed, I guess? It seems the people that are impressed with my stuff have little experience. Little kids like watching me draw, and people that don't write much like what I write...

Merlin

I finished watching the Merlin series.
I ran onto it by accident in high school, I think. I watched the first season. Then a few years later, I discovered that there were more seasons. Heh.
It was fun. A bit predictable maybe, but fun. They probably could have cut out one of the seasons to slim out extra episodes, but I guess that's often the case.
I like the characters.
Except old Merlin freaks me out... Probably because he tried to be freaky as an old person?

I'm a bit torn by the ending.
After the finale, there wasn't much resolution. We didn't figure out what happened to Merlin, or the dragons.
But Arthur... TT^TT They changed so much of the original Artur legend, couldn't they have changed that too?
TT^TT

Comic Author

So, I went to an author event today.
It was a talk by a guy named Gene Luen Yang. He's written some comics, one of which won an award. That's actually the only one of his I read, called American Born Chinese. It was a good book. Funny, but a bit sad too. And now I want to read his other stuff. ^-^
I checked out a couple of his other books already.
He actually helps on some of the Avatar LAst Airbender comics! Like The Search and The Promise. Which are a lot of fun too~ I wonder if the next book is out yet on the newest series...
He said how awesome it was that he could call the creaters of Airbender, and they actually answer his call.

It was a fun event. There were a bunch of parents with kids. Not a ton of people, but that meant that everyone could interact more.
He talked about some of the history of comics, and how Chinese culture was included in them. And at the end, he did an activity (probably mainly for the kids) about making characters. It was fun though, since some of the elements o the characters were random.
I got a copy of the American born Chinese, and he signed it for me~ He talked to everony in the signing line, encouraging the kids, and drawing little sketches in the books.
Now I have about four signed books. ^-^

Paul McCartney!!!!

We just got back from the Paul McCartney Candlestick Park concert!
It was freaking amazing!
I'm still totally wired up even though it's almost 1:00 AM. I guess I should probably try to get to sleep though. I'll report more once I have photos up. ^-^/

Working with Kids

While I was volunteering at the ranch this summer, I started thinking about something.
I am the oldest volunteer there. Most of the others are between 12 and 15 years old. And I generally get along with everyone, both kid and helper (it helps that they think I'm only about 17). But not all the helpers are as popular with the kids, or with each other.
For example, there was one kid there, who was 12 and a helper for the first time (he was the shortest, and I was worried that I'd get him mixed up with the kids). And he was one of the kids that others tend to pick on. It was just a little bit, but I could tell. I've gotten very good at spotting them. Because I seem to attract them a lot. Probably because I'm nice to them all the time (I have some friends in this category too XD ). I was like that for a bit , in elementary and middle school, so I feel the need to be nice to them since they might not get it from as many other people. And I know what it feels like. Anyway, this boy hung out around me a lot as the camp wore on.

But it got me thinking. Kids like me. And the helpers like me too. So I started wondering why that was for me and not as much for others.
And I thought of three big reasons.

When kids are talking, do your best to listen to them. And since a lot of them try to talk at the same time, it can be impossible to hear all of them. Some kids will get drowned out more than others. So they will kind of drift off and be quiet, and feel ignored. So, if that happens, ask them to repeat themselves. Be interested in what they have to say, and respond with enthusiasm.
Don't be superior to the kids. Yeah, you may need to give them instructions, or correct them if they do something wrong. You may even need to scold them. But that does not mean that you act like you are superior to them. Treat them as a friend, not as someone who's smaller than you and doesn't know as much. They probably get that enough from most other people... Kids can be really sharp.
And third, the most important reason. Like everyone. Some people might prefer to pretend to like everyone. Which I suppose is better than openly not liking them. But then you have to pretend, and it's not really honest. So it's better to just like everyone. Admittedly, some kids can be trouble. But even so, there's usually something that you can find to appreciate about them. Or something that you can get them interested in. (For example, I brought a sketchbook, and drew Pokémon during free time. A bunch of the kids crowded around to watch, and some of these were the rowdy boys that might otherwise be mischief-making. Instead they started gaming conversations and watched me draw. I've noticed that kids really like watching me draw. I may not be great, but at least I'm good. And they think I'm a master, so it's funny and cute). I have yet to find a kid with no interesting qualities. But it's those kids that really need the most positive attention. Because if they are trouble, then it must have a source.

Mr. Banks

We saw Saving Mr. Banks.
It was a good movie. And a fun perspective too.
I can completely understand how the author of Mary Poppins must have felt. It must be so hard to give up your characters and story for someone else to interpret in their own way. And their interpretation may go against your views. It seems like it would be such a gamble. Movies based off of books can be so amazing. Or they can also turn a good book into a complete piece of garbage as a film.
I can see her reluctance with Disney.
As I've said before, I generally love Disney. But they do twist a lot of stuff around to fit their ideas and their model of a story. For example, Frozen has almost no similarities to the original fairy tale, besides an ice queen and a frozen heart.
Up to the point Mary Poppins was made, I liked most of those Disney cartoons (and a lot of the film movies were good too, though I haven't seen all of them). But nowadays Disney makes so much stuff that a lot of it just isn't good. And a lot of it I'd never even heard of, though it still looks kinda weird.
It makes me wonder though. Under what circumstances would I turn my characters and stories over to another?

A Wonderful Bunny

So, on Wednesday, we had to put Alaska to sleep.
She's been with me for 12 years - half of my life.
It's strange to realize how much I think about her in a day, now that she's gone.
I bring her into my room every morning. And every time I walk into my room, I say hello to her. I wonder when I'll stop thinking that when I walk into my room.
I remember when I lost Midnight, for months I'd see Mom's black purse from the corner of my eye, or something black sitting around and think that it was Midnight.
Animals have such short lives, but they bring so much happiness.

Alaska was the best rabbit I could have hoped for. My family and a bunch of my friends loved to visit and pet her, and she was always happy to get attention. She'd give kisses, and back when she could walk properly, she would come when I called. She's also come and sit under m computer chair so I'd pick her up and snuggle with her. She was more a lap pet than either of my cats.
She took a lot of maintenance as she got older. First her ears got something of a permanent infection, and I had to keep them clean, which felt awful to her. Then her arm started not working properly. Eventually it sort of hung useless beside her. Then about a year ago she got an abscess tooth, which I had to clean for a long time until it finally stopped being nasty. Though there was still a permanent lump on her jaw.
Then Tuesday night, I found something really awful, and brought her to the vet the next morning. And there was nothing they could do. The treatment that would have been required was risky for a 2-year-old rabbit, let along a 12-year-old rabbit.
And so we had to say goodbye to my sweet bunny.
This must have been the last picture I took of her. Or at least the last one that's in focus.

My parents and I had a funeral for her in the back yard, and I spent the rest of the day taking everything off of every surface in my room and cleaning it. There was a lot of dust and rabbit fur. And a few years ago, I suddenly became allergic to Alaska, and my entire room. Despite all my attempts to keep my room clean. So now that everything is clean and the floor is mopped, I might be able to breathe properly for the first time in a few years (except when I got to Japan or Portland...) Even last night I could start to breathe again.
I guess my room is cleaner than it's been in 12 years. But I'll still always picture my bunny sitting in the corner by my bookshelf.

Bunny

I'm really worried about Alaska...

Fern-Floating on Clouds

Here's that Fern painting I mentioned earlier.

Getting strangled. >:/

Bleh. I got stung by a bee today, I think. That hasn't happened in many many years. Last time Is stepped on a bee, my foot swelled way up.
I'm glad that hasn't happened this time, considering I got stung in the neck. It's a little bit puffy, just a tiny bit. But because of that, it feels like there's pressure on my throat. It's a really freaky sensation, though faint enough that I can ignore it most of the time.
Stupid bee.

Anyway, I finished filling a sketchbook today. I think I only have about 5 or 6 of these big ones. This one's been in progress for about 2 years.
Not I get to start a fresh new one. I wonder what my first drawing should be. Hmm.

Lots of good story ideas in my sketchbook. Almost all of my Retriever pairs are in there. Except for Rishi. Poor Rishi is last. I'll have to do him and Menth soon. Then maybe I'll do some of the teachers, like Master Rall and Mr. Handal.
Recently I've been using pictures from other artists on DA to practice different styles and techniques. I kind of twist their drawings to fit my own characters. XP I posted a couple of the paintings on DA. I forget if I put the second one on my blog yet... better check.
I finished coloring a couple more, but I don't think I'll post them.

I think my best pictures in here are some of my Retrievers, some of the pictures I copied from other artists ( XP ), and my pictures of Elsa, Chao, and Jack Frost.

A World Without Sunsets

We had a beautiful sunset this evening. The sun was a vivid gold, dying the clouds, sending beams of light up into the sky.
When I was at the nature program last week, the instructor told me a story.
A while ago, there were three Chinese girls in a program he was part of. The whole time, they were on their cell phones, not appreciating nature at all, even though that's what their program was about.
Finally at the end, Sundara took them on a walk up the hill, just before sunset. He blindfolded them and lead them up the hill. Then just as the sunset was approaching its most brilliant, he took off their blindfolds.
The girls all gasped and stared open-mouthed at the sunset before them.
And for several minutes, they were speechless and riveted to the scene before them. They remained there until the sun was gone.
Sundara was a bit confused about how entranced they were. It was definitely a beautiful sunset, but not many people would be so absorbed into a sunset as these girls were.
It turns out that these girls had never seen a sunset before.
They were from Beijing, where the sky is so dirty that bright sunsets don't happen, apparently.

I knew Beijing had dirty sky, but to think that people there have gone their entire lives without seeing a sunset is shocking to me.
And Beijing is not the only place with bad air...
This is the kind of world we live in. A world where thousands, or millions, of people live without sunsets.
This is the world I want to change. Because everyone should be able to watch the sun set and the sky turn to fire and gold.

More hearts.

I know I said I'd stop but some of these are so TT^TT


If any of my recent hearts are reported, I'll just attach them to this post. Probably.


Here's the big batches of hearts I made.

Mark Twain says Write

Yesterday, Mark Twain told me to keep writing.

Okay, it was a reenactor of Mark Twain, but it was still fun. He asked me what I was studying. And it wasn't until I said environmental studies and "creative writing" that I realized the parallel and laughed. And he remembered that apparently, because when he saw me later he said to keep writing.

I wonder what it must be like to be a reenactor. It seems like it would be fun.
Actually. I sort of did do that once. In high school, for a trial we put on, I had to dress up and act as Mark Twain. I stuck a big fuzzy moustache to my lip with a glob of glue from a gluestick. Because the special glue we bought wouldn't open, even when someone tried stomping on it.
Mark Twain is definitely a great writer. I've gotta read more of his stuff.

Getting Outdoors

I have had very limited internet access over the past several days, so I'll write this post now. From Friday to Sunday, I went up to Nevada City to do a program about getting more in touch with nature. I stayed up there with Mom a couple days longer.
It was a very nice program.
The first evening, before the program started, I sat outside, intending to read some of the books the program was based off of. They're by a person named Joseph Cornell. The four I read over the weekend were good books. One has a bunch of activities for getting kids outdoors and having fun. Anyway, that first evening I didn't really read much. Instead I ended up watching a flock of young geese and a bunch of 7 turkeys (with one young one) warring over the grass. It was funny. The turkeys kept chasing the geese away. Then the geese would come back and the turkeys would chase them away again.
Then the second day, I followed a doe and her two little fawns. I went slowly enough that the mom didn't even look at me. The babies looked at me a few times though. I wish I had the good camera with me~
On Sunday, we closed the program. And I spent about an hour picking wild blackberries. They tasted really good~
Then on Monday morning, I found a group of nine bucks. I spent about 20 minutes among them, moving incredibly slow. I've never gotten so near wild deer before. It was really cool. And that time I had the good camera. Maybe I'll put up some pictures. One of them even lay down about 15 feet from me. They were very relaxed. I wish I could have spent more time, but I had to go meet my Mom.
I spent another hour picking blackberries. And then I helped a old friend pick cucumbers and sort fruit from the farm.
And that evening we went swimming in the Yuba River. It's such a beautiful place to go swimming. With all the rocks and caves and tunnels, and big granite boulders to go jumping around on. It makes every pool seem incredibly lame.
It was such a nice trip. I didn't do too much, but I relaxed and spent a lot of time outdoors.