Bleeding Fiction

Philip K. Dick is now an android.

It's...

I just...

Yeah.

I'm now three weeks into, or one third of the way through, my intensive Japanese class. We're covering an entire year of Japanese in nine weeks; that means we're doing the equivalent of ten weeks, or one school term/quarter, in three weeks. That means that the big test I took yesterday was the equivalent of a final exam.

My main problem with Japanese is the little things. I'll forget a particle here or there; I'll leave off a trailing "i" or a small "tsu" in the middle of a word; I'll miss a stroke on a kanji. Details, really, though not unimportant ones. My test yesterday was almost entirely multiple choice. That was a great relief. Recognition is much easier than reproduction. I think I did pretty well.

Class, homework and studying eat up most of my free time during the week, but I've managed to start developing a new comic, late at night and in short class breaks. It'd be a six issue mini-series; a theme piece, really. It incorporates a lot of the stuff I've learned about Aum Shinrikyo and it's title is inspired by part of something The Ogre™ once said to me. It's called "Truth and Madness".

Ah, the simple joys of relentless mockery. The Mary Sue Generator. Caution the names; they're all women's.

I took and spin and discovered a wonderful new Mary Sue: Margarita Valentine, with Passionate Azure eyes, Cascading Curls of Ripe Bronze hair and smelling of Spicy Sandalwood, is a Force Adept Professional Athlete that is (not so) secretly Han Solo's Long-lost Twin.

Fun game!

I stole this from Bekah, who stole it from someone else:

"This is the problem with [blogs], we all think we are so close, and we know nothing about each other. I'm going to rectify it. I want you to ask me something you think you should know about me. Something that should be obvious, but you have no idea about. Then post this in your [blog] and find out what people don't know about you."

It's been a long while since I played Truth or Dare. I'm hitting a funny point right now where I'm having trouble remember things; not so good, when my summer is all about memorization. Maybe this'll help me remember. Ask whatever you want.

Some new neighbors moved into the apartment downstairs from mine a few days ago. I haven't seen much of them, but I can tell you that I've heard them. How best to put it? Well, the phrase "their lust is insatiable" is accurate, but it doesn't do the experience of living above them justice unless I explain that their lust is also noisy.

There are easier things to go to sleep to than the exceedingly loud sounds of other people having sex. Three times. There are better noises to wake up to. And, dear God, there are many, many things that I would rather be hearing at 7 o'clock on a Sunday evening.

I'm glad that these two people have a healthy, active relationship. I just wish they wouldn't feel the need to share it with their neighbors...

(and other places)

I've been pretty busy this week, which isn't much surprising. Japanese class continues to kick my ass. As of mid-day on Wednesday I passed the half-way point for the class, which means it's pretty much all downhill from here. I'm getting a C right now and my hope is that I can keep that grade from dropping further. We'll see.

I've also given up on this whole "working in museums" idea I had. I can't get a museum job I'd want without spending another 4 years in school and the museum jobs I can get I really don't want. Plus, I miss the sort of work I was doing at InterSlice all to hell. With that decision behind me, I thought I'd try to switch programs - maybe into the general International Studies Masters or into the Masters in Public Affairs program. At the very least, I figured I could do the International Development and Relief Graduate Certification.

None of that's happening. My odds of getting into those programs aren't bad, but I'd still have to apply. Which I couldn't do until next year. So I'd be finishing out the Japan Studies Masters before moving on to another Masters, anyway. That's just dumb. So, I'm going to just take it a little easy next year and finish out this Masters and see if I can get myself a job that way. It should work.

Yesterday, I went on a four year overdue tour of the Seattle Underground. It was visually cool as hell; century-old brick vaulting and anchoring masonry accessable through a series of innocuous doors in building faces. I was disappointed only in the limited scope of the tour and in the way the underground came about. The underground itself actually covers an area about 25 blocks on a side, running under pretty much the entire downtown section of the city, but the tour itself only covers about one square block, and you file through it in a line. So I lost a lot of the impact of how massive this area could be. Also, the underground was deliberately created by the city as a way of avoiding tidal floods back in the late 19th century. A lot of the mystery and magic of having an underground city (of sorts) is lost when you realize it didn't come around by accident.

I also bought two albums yesterday. The first was The Shins' Chutes Too Narrow and the second was They Might Be Giants' Flood. I haven't listened to Chutes Too Narrow yet; I've been too amused by listening to Istanbul (Not Constantinople) over and over and over again.

I think that about covers it.

I forgot to mention:

I can't seem to send email or connect to AIM right now. I don't know why. If you want to communicate something to me that requires a response, please call.

Waaaay back in October I was talking about one of the reasons that I don't like stories going on for too long and writers, even writers news to a series, running out of things to say.

This is a really, really good example of another reason why I hate it. Keep in mind that every plot pointed mentioned in the little cartoon is true.

When is it that you actually use that fancy new internet connection of yours? Is it a time that those of us who are similarly equipped can intersect with you?

Let me know.

Also let me know what your current email addy is.

Please.

My email works again. Yay!

So does AIM.

My family has a long and intimate history with the Boy Scouts and I have an old personal association with the organization. Broadly speaking, I approve of Scouting's mission. I mention this as a preface to demonstrate my reverence for the ideals of Scouting, because I'm about to poke fun of them and I wouldn't want you to think I was being wholly unkind.

When I was a Scout, the organization provided the finest paramilitary training for young people that money could buy. At least in the later half of the 20th century. We learned to build fires, to survive long hikes, to fire rifles and make watch towers. We were tough, rugged, manly boys, mostly involved in Scouting because of the excuse it gave us for playing with sharp objects and our penchant for starting fires.

Our leaders, too, were a rough and tumble sort. They were community leaders, fathers, brave and noble veterans of foreign wars and, occasionally, pedophiles.

I'd like to know what happened to Scouting since my day. I'd like to know when, exactly, the organization became a haven for the sort of people you'd read about in the Darwin Awards. It seems that four Scout Leaders were trying to pitch a tent during the Scout's national Jamboree yesterday. They were standing too close to a power line. hilarity ensued.

Needless to say we mourn for these four men. Scouting mourns, a nation mourns. President Bush was due to speak to the assembled Scouts today. I wonder why, since he was only ever a Cub Scout. Anyway, due to the weather he wasn't able to make it. However, while waiting out in the sun for the President to arrive, about three hundred people had some sort of heat stroke.

Scouting, like any group designed to brainwash people, is big on memorized phrases. One of them is the Scout Oath. It goes (from memory, mind you, and emphasis mine): "On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country, to help other people at all times and to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight." As an American pubescent male, maybe I didn't take that whole thing seriously all of the time, but I always knew it was a pretty good way to live my life. I leapt across my fair share of camp fires, but I kept my wits about me enough to come in from under the sun on a hot day and not to camp near power lines.

Week 6 of the Japanese class ended yesterday, which puts me 2/3 of the way through. Only 3 weeks to go, which is something I'm very happy about. My grades are slipping a little, which is frustrating, as they weren't tremendously great to begin with. It's stressful and the fact that I don't get a full night's sleep during the week because I have to wake up for class isn't helping. The result is that my back right now is perpetually sore. I feel like the entire thing has become a network of knots.

Only 3 weeks to go, though, which is good. Also on Monday I'm going to start working with a tutor for a few hours a week, which should help me out immensely. My tutor is cute, too, which isn't something you're likely to hear me complain about and gives me motivation to do well.

Beyond that, things have been a little odd here the past few weeks. With the first volume of the Fables wrapped up I gave myself a bit of a vacation from writing. It's saved me a lot more stress during the week, but it's left my weekends sort of wide open, which has prompted me to do things like not get out of bed until noon. I need to find something to get me out of bed earlier on Saturdays and Sundays. Send ideas. Also, send cute girls.