Horsies

I should post an update now that I'm not about to collapse into exhausted sleep XP

We arrived on Saturday. The trip was good. Until we got near the entrance to the park. Then it took two hours to wait in line to get in and drive through the valley.
After that, we find out that the person I was supposed to check in with wasn't there that day.
So, that was frustrating.
But we sent the rest of the day exploring, which made me feel better.
I checked in the next day.
Orientation was on Monday, and then I was shown to my home for the summer.
Work started on Tuesday at 6 AM.

I love the horses, but man my knees are killing me. XD
It's been three days, and I've gone on three trail rides each. Each ride is two hours.
My bones and muscles aren't used to saddles anymore. It's been too long since I've ridden.
I'm still surprised they hired me, since everyone else has tons of experience with horses, while my experience is from a long time ago.

But it's definitely beautiful here. I can't wait to explore when we get a day off. We're understaffed now, so it might be a while before I get to do some in-depth exploration.

As I feared, there's no cell service here.
But I do get internet, which is great.

I miss my cat.

Phoenix Dragons

I've drawn the Phoenix dragons from Katani's story.


They don't have a very big role, although Zane (the yellow one) does play a role near the end.

Zane is Youka's Phoenix dragon.
Pishi is black - with Melly.
Nua is the green one, and she's Rishi's friend.

And with this, I think I've finally drawn all of the dragons from Katani's story @_@

My Biggest Creative Influences

I started thinking recently about what works had the biggest influence on my story-telling.
Here they are. A combination of books, movies, and games.


Studio Ghibli is a given.
I hope to be able to write the way Miyazaki makes movies.
I grew up with Totoro and Kiki. His films have been part of my life forever. I love that you can love the films, no matter how old you are.
And I love how detailed and alive and gorgeous they are.


There's an old computer game called The Longest Journey. I was super into that game during middle school.
In that game, you travel back and forth between two worlds. The main character lives in a futuristic world called Stark. She can travel to a fantasy world called Arcadia. The cultures they developed in that game are amazing.
That game is probably the reason that I have multiple worlds. I have three separate worlds, on different planes of existence. They are like sister planets that exist on different dimensions. It is possible (though very difficult) for people to travel between the three worlds.


The Immortals is a four-book series by Tamora Pierce.
While I was reading that, I was blown away by the idea that someone could have magic that let them talk to animals and turn into animals.
That idea lead to a character who was the predecessor of Fern.
Fern's magic has changed a lot since then, but she can still talk to animals and turn into animals @_@


In middle school, I saw the first X-Men movie.

I was immediately hooked on it. Even more so when the second movie came out.
Fern first developed as my own X-Men character. She started as a side character, and then she grew from there.
I wrote out an entire X-Men fanfic starring Fern. Which I've never shared with people, and never will because of the sucky writing. Plus I'm sure the plots would interest no one besides me.

In Middle school (wow, a lot of my influences are from middle school. I guess that makes sense, since that's when I started doing a lot of writing), I stumbled across a short story called The Smallest Dragonboy.
It was a short story from the Dragonriders of Pern series.
That short story got me hooked on dragons. I even started designing my own dragon story, which was basically a knockoff of the Pern world.
My dragon society has evolved a lot since then. But there are still some similarities, like the different varieties of dragons. And the telepathy thing, although I didn't get the idea of "thought Speech" from Pern.

Speaking of Thought Speech (AKA telepathy) that became a major part of my stories because of a book called Kinship With All Life.



So far, all of these have had clear influences on my writing. The following are not so clear. I can't point to anything specific that these have lead to. But I think that their existence has been an influence on my creativity.


Pokemon. The idea of traveling with fascinating creatures. Training them, bonding with them, fighting evil, and catching them all.


Harry Potter did influence one of my older stories. But that story needs to be trashed and redone from the ground up.
Still, it's a great inspiration for creating magic worlds.

The book Watership Down has been one of my favorite books since I read it in middle school. I want to read it again.
The way he developed the culture, mythology, and society of rabbits is amazing.


I feel like Star Wars (mostly episodes 4-6, but also 1-3) must have had some impact on my story stuff.
Probably Legend of Zelda too.

Maximum Ride (which I read in high school) is the reason Fern became so reliant on her wings.

The movie Atlantis. I watched it over and over when it was in theaters. I bought a bunch of magazines that talked about the culture of Atlantis, as well as bios of all the awesome characters.


I'm pretty sure Steven Universe has become a new one. If nothing else, it gives me a drive to create (a lot of things do that, depending on surrounding circumstances).
But Steven Universe does have great characters. And I love how the people of Beach City are so accepting.

Life Behind Characters

People get very excited to meet actors that play their favorite characters.
I'm sure there are a lot of reasons for this. But I'd bet that one reason is that meeting the actor is almost like meeting the character.
It's probably the closest you could come to meeting a character from a movie or show.

I wonder how actors feel about this. After all, they may play a character, but that doesn't mean that they ARE the character.



But at the same time, the actors are the people who brought the character to life. That character has become a part of them, however small. And they have portrayed the character in a way to gain the love of the audience.



It's a pretty amazing thing they're able to do.

Change is Ever-Present, but Still Scary

Well, I've been on the job hunt for a while now.
I've probably done a pretty poor job, because I've bee too picky in the positions that I apply for. Especially considering that I want to work with animals, and there's a lot of competition for those kinds of jobs around here.

And now the job that I least expected to get seems to be the job that wants me.

Everything's moving so fast, it's making my head spin. I just found out today that they have officially hired me. Originally they wanted me by the end of the month. But it turns out they now want me there this Saturday.
It's not close to home. I'll be living there. In one of the most beautiful places on the planet. Working with horses.
It's incredible.
And I still can't really wrap my head around it.

My priorities are pretty weird.
For example, I really don't want to leave my cat.
And I feel so bad that I'll be missing visits from some of my relatives over the summer. But I'll try to make it home to visit them for at least a couple days.

I'll be away for about three months. It's a tourist season job.
I'm technically close enough that I could vdrive there and back in one day (to visit home), but it would be around 8 hours for a round trip. So I'll probably only come home a couple times.

It's amazing. And also pretty scary, considering I've never been away from home for more than a month. And I've never lived away from home.
So, this will be some good experience (and did I mention scary?).

I still only have a vague idea about my living situation.
And about a lot of other things.

Whoo. Big stuff. And I only have about four days to plan.

Positive Criticism

Recently I did a couple critique swaps over the internet.
The more you read and write, the better you get at helping people find areas in which to improve.
But I think there's one area of critiquing that I've actually got worse at recently.

A good critique comes in two parts. You tell your partner what they should work on. But you also tell your critique partner what they are doing well.
The critique is ultimately to help someone improve. But if all you do is list off flaws, it makes it sound like you don't think they're doing anything right.
You tell your partner what works, partly so they know what they are doing right. But also so they don't feel like a failure. It can take a lot of courage to share art with others.

I think I've gotten worse at finding compliments to give my critique partner.
In one case, it was because the writing just wasn't that great.
But another part of it is that my tastes are becoming more and more picky. So if something doesn't fit those tastes, it can be tricky for me to find positive comments.
I still do my best to pick out what they do right. But I feel like some of them are pretty shallow. I wonder if it comes across that way. I guess it does.
I think if something doesn't fit in my tastes, it has to be incredibly excellent for me to compliment it. Otherwise, even if it's good, I don't seem to know what to say.

And there's also a third factor. I had not actually gotten excited about anything since the year started. So it was probably harder than usual for me to find compliments.
Like I said, even the new Steven Universe episodes didn't interest me until about a week ago.
I got super obsessed with Breath of the Wild, but even that wasn't really excitement. It was mostly a really fantastic way to reroute some negative energy.


Last week was the most up-and-down Fanime ever. And this is coming from someone who once lost all of my cash the moment I arrived at Fanime (and then felt like a loser because I had to borrow money from my friends for the rest of the day). Usually I'm obsessive about making sure everything it tidied away and safe, so that kind of thing hadn't really happened to me before. Definitely not on that large a scale, value-wise.

Right after Fanime, there were those Steven Universe episodes I wrote about. And the three minutes where Lars does amazing stuff.
I cannot stop thinking about it.
All the other stuff with Lars feels like it's clicked into place.
Aah, man I want to freak out about it with someone who actually knows what I'm talking about.
I even played a few older episodes for Dad, which I guess he liked, but I think a lot of it went over his head.

I really really like Lars now. Which I didn't expect. Yaay for character development!
But something I expected even less is that I really want him to get home to see Sadie.
I almost never get into romances, and I don't think I've ever rooted for characters to get together. At least I can't think of any.
But now I actually want these two to finally get together?
@_@

I've been letting random episodes of Steven Universe play on my itunes for the past week, since I can't get it out of my head. There are a few moments where Lars drops his "jerk exterior" that are now making me laugh my head off. Mostly the ones that involve Sadie.

Like in "The New Lars," when he falls out of his chair when he learns Steven told Sadie that Lars loves her.


And "The Good Lars" when he says "if I show up to this party with my family's weird purple cake and with Sadie, everybody's gonna know I love baking and everybody's gonna know I love..."

:3

I guess I let myself get carried away in the second half of this post. Considering it started out as somethign incredibly different.
But I'm glad I did. While I was writing this, I realized why I've gotten so into these new episodes. I think it's because that scene with Lars the first thing I've gotten excited about this year.

Thank you Lars.
Just make sure you get home safe. Or, at least with no more damage than you've already gotten.

Street-corner Libraries

When I was in Portland, we drove past something that looked like a really big birdhouse. My aunt told me that it's a box where people leave books. So anyone can come by and grab a book that looks interesting to them. And if anyone has books that they're done with, they can leave them behind for anyone else.
I loved that idea, but unfortunately I wasn't able to take pictures.

Then I found another book box, much closer to home!
I made sure to take pictures so I could share it with you.



I wonder how you get one of these started. That would be interesting to look into.

Off-Color

Actually, I haven't gotten into any Steven Universe episodes this year. The last one I really enjoyed was with Pearl and the mystery girl (although I did love the scene where Ruby and Sapphire meet baby Steven. You just know that's the first time Ruby and Sapphire have split up in years, and they make the baby cry. "Waaah! Garnet broke in half!").

But last night I watched the new episodes.

I've never had much of an opinion about Lars. There's obviously a cool guy somewhere in there. But that side of him is so rare that I always wondered why Steven hangs around him. Even Steven calls him a jerk.
Plus a couple episodes ago, he totally abandons Sadie when she's calling for help. Low.

Potential spoilers, mostly for the Off Colors episode. But I'll be as vague as possible.

I was surprised to find that Lars had been dragged along with Steven. It meant that he was going to be important.
And then he gets that surge of confidence in the kindergarten. Man, he is awesome in that fight.


And then was the scene that stuck in my head.
The robot explodes, and Lars crashes and falls. Like a rag doll.
It's not even the crying scene afterwords that gets to me. Just the crash and the fall.
He always looked kinda fragile, like a toothpick. I guess this scene proved it.

A while ago, I wrote a post about moments like these that catch in my head.
It happens when there's a character that is always strong and unflappable. And that character falls.
I never thought that Lars would fit in that category. He certainly likes to act like he's above everything, but he's nothing like the other characters.

Basically, I was shocked, both by the scene and by my reaction to it.

Scenes like this have only gotten to me a handful of times. There hasn't been one in a few years. I think the closest it has happened at all recently was in Tiger and Bunny. When Tiger gets beat up by Jake and rushed to the hospital. But that part is so brief that it didn't hit me as much as the others.

But man, what's going to happen to Lars now? I'm assuming he'll get home again. So how is this going to affect the rest of his life?
I doubt Sadie will be bothered by his new look. But she might be... unhappy about Lars abandoning her.

I wonder what happened to Lion too. I bet at this point, most people have stopped wondering why he's pink. I wonder how old he is. Is he from just before Steven was born, or is he super old? Maybe he's the lion from the Buddy Budwick diary episode.


Yeah, I never would have thought I'd get so fascinated about Lars.
Well played.


Also, random comments about nothing in particular.
I freaked out when I saw Paul McCartney in the new Pirates of the Caribbean.
And why does every other episode of one Punch Man end up with naked guys fighting?

Now off to work on some sticky bits of writing stuff @_@

Strange Magic

I have a very long list of movies I'm supposed to watch (it doesn't count TV series, or anime). One movie I rented last year was a digital animation called Strange Magic.



It's like Midsummer Night's Dream meets Epic and Beauty and the Beast. With an extra dose of singing and sassy princesses.
You know of course when a girl sings that she'll never fall in love again, that she will definitely be in love at the end of the movie.

It was an easy movie to make fun of.

Although I was intrigued by the Beauty and the Beast thing.
And there was some good singing.

Glinda is in the movie! (Kristen Chenowith) The role of a sugarplum fairy seems perfect for her. I've never really seen her in anything else, so it was cool to run onto her.
And man, Nightcrawler can sing! (Alan Cumming)

Last week, I rented the movie again.
And I actually liked it. @_@
I was making fun of the sappy fairy romance, and now I actually like it.

I guess I must be a sucker for the Beauty and the Beast thing.

Help me.