I drew a thing

This thing:

It's a Dead Space Necromorph. I found my favourite picture of one (it's the sculpture one - it's really cool) and stayed up for about two hours last night staring at it and drawing this little guy. Inn't he cute?

It's so weird to me though because I stopped drawing (just kind of fell out of it) when I was... wow, maybe fourteen? I'm almost 21 now and this... this is what I choose to get back into drawing with???

*sigh* I don't know, right now my entire brain is just like:

• ??????
• ???????????
• ???????!!

So. Yeah.

A lot is going on right now. I'm planning a lot of things. I'm slowly getting back into my writing groove. Oh, and an illustrator offered me a gift - an Outlast art request - since I'd been writing for the series for a little while. So that was really awesome ^.^

Mum and I are going to have to make up a schedule like we did for the last quarter because my classes are set up in an unforgivably stupid way. I just... it really makes me want to punch people. I don't understand why people can't set things up logically and clearly.

But that's not the point. The point is that I'm still alive, I want to draw, I want to write, I want to sew, I kind of want to do ALL THE THINGS.

So. I'm going to let my computer charge and then try to figure out just what the hell is going on with school. I mean, seriously now.

*headdesk*

I'm gonna go eat and then maybe write about journalists.

School Again Soon

I'm not sure how to feel. I haven't been on campus in a while. I know where my classes are at least and that's good. I always get ridiculously stressed about school and then I'm fine after about the first week.

Also, on a completely random note, this thing [right here] lets you listen to Wikipedia. Pluck sounds are an addition, strings are subtractions, and the pitch says how big the edit is. It's just really amazing to sit and listen to.

Oh, and because I have this open and I'm pretty sure not a lot of people read this blog anyway

Birthday wishlish thing:

• MKULTRA : The CIA's Top Secret Program in Human Experimentation and Behavior Modification [book]
• The CIA Doctors: Human Rights Violations by American Psychiatrists [book]
• Really anything decent about MKUltra or OPERATION PAPERCLIP. It's really interesting to me for some reason.
• Giant Microbes are always a good bet.
• The Milestone Anthology for this year.

I might think of a game I want to beg for by then but for right now, these are the things I've been thinking about the most. ... You, know, looking at this, I think I understand why I have very few friends.

Oh, well XD

*SCREAMS*

This thing. THIS THING HERE IS OUT and I'm in it.

Also:

• I just read your fic and it was fantastic! That’s exactly how I imagined things going on.
• I love the way you write.
• I love fanfics when the picture is in your head and you feel like watching a movie, that’s [the] kind of fanfics I appreciate, because not everyone has this thing. You can read and you don’t see the picture clearly, and when you’re done reading, you can’t remember what was all that about. But in your case when I try to remember what it was all about - it flashes like a movie.
• You described Miles so in character
• Thank you so much for writing, it’s the best thing I’ve read in a long time.
• It’s so hard to find this kind of fanfics, so everytime time I find something - it’s like treasure.
• So thank you so much for writing, your fic really made my day.
• Please, never stop writing Outlast fics! They’re just too great.

All of that ^^^ was in a longer post that someone made about a simple, rambly little thing I wrote about Miles Upshur (from the game Outlast). It was 1,105 words and it took me... maybe two-to-three hours total, edits and all (it's hard to say since I was distracted a lot of the day, working in fits and starts).

But this is how my mind works: I see all of this, read and reread it several times, clip out pieces to put in this post, and I will bet you two of my fingers (lol Outlast reference) that I forget about it in a few days and go back to doubting myself. Why? It's like I can't accept the fact that I have some measure of talent and that that's been improved by all the writing I've been doing and that maybe - just maybe - I'd have a chance on my own, under my own banner, so to speak.

Maybe I need to work on that.

My grandparents were both impressed by that little traffic report I wrote (Grandpa even said my writing was 'brilliant') and Mum has always been supportive - she's even told me that I was better than her at fiction (which I just asdfghjkl;) and then there's all the sweethearts I seem to meet online who like the little things I write and I just... *sigh* yeah. It's... it's been a day today.

Pictures and Stuff Like That

First off, a new blog theme has been fitted on tumblr:

This new theme features all pages contained in the spinning disk on the sidebar, cleaning up the interface and leaving more room for description and decoration. The colour scheme is black, purple, white, and blue and the background is an image of New York City, featuring a quote from Gottfried Leibniz on the right-hand side.

This new theme is expected to last well into 2014.

And now, a look at the academic calendar:

Stress is expected and participants in all academic activities are reminded to take frequent breaks for video games and social media. *shuffles papers* Oh. It seems that two classes have been added to the three seen here - Algebra and an Introduction to World Languages. In the interest of saving both trees and money, neither of these classes require textbooks.

In addition to their standard academic studies of mind control and medical care, students will also be learning about microbes this year. Each student will get to take home and look after cute, fuzzy giant microbes just like this guy:

Mortimer the Mad Cow Microbe. Bovine spongiform encephalopathy never looked so cute~

And now, traffic:

The world is quiet. Darkness floods the streets in slow motion, bleeding out from the evening's long shadows. The stars hang low in their black velvet ocean.

The car's tires squeal as it rounds the corner, losing traction and sliding.

"Stop the car!" the woman screams. "Stop the car!"

The man doesn't listen. He stands on the accelerator.

The car runs onto the grass and stops, scraping the retaining wall and resting, wedged onto the neighbourhood's water main. The man runs down a long hill. And the woman runs down a dark street. And the neighbours, having heard the crash, pull on their shoes and take the steps down to the night-flooded street at a jog.

The car's lights are flashing but there is no horn, no water hissing, no sound but the concerned murmurs and calls of the neighbours, fading in the still, slightly sticky air left over after a warm day.

The woman is found. She is bleeding but fixable. She is walking and speaking and the police arrive and she walks and speaks with them. I walk and speak with my neighbours, on the night-flooded street, while the stars hang low in their black velvet ocean.

This has been - traffic.*

And now, the weather.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Wonderful news, Writerland.

I am, of course, very aware of the date today. While I refuse to completely ignore the significance of the eleventh of September in American history, I feel that I am not qualified (or possibly not eloquent enough) to speak on it at length. Or at all, to be perfectly honest.

On quite a different note, I feel I have to share that today is the one month anniversary of my friendship-marriage to my darling Ryo - a very wonderful friend of mine. I really couldn't ask for a better friend than her and I am so glad that she stumbled across an old post of mine and sent me a message. It's likely that we never would have started talking without that. And I really can't express how saddened I am at that thought.

We'll meet for the first time AFK* at DashCon in 2014 and it would be impossible to explain how much I'm looking forward to it.

Now, Writerland, as the sun rises and day begins for many of you, I leave you with this, one of my favourite quotations:

"...A little acid, sharpness or bitterness is often more pleasing than sugar; shadows enhance colours; and even a dissonance in the right place gives relief to harmony."

Do not fear the darkness; it resides within each of us. Do not fear the pain of living; it is pain that reminds us that we live. Embrace all that life has for you, be it good, bad, or simply the cold gnawing of utter apathy. Know that you feel because you live. And you live because your existence matters. This world - this lovely, broken mess of a world - would not be the same without you.

Goodnight, Writerland. Goodnight.
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* This actually happened. Some idiot wrecked at the end of the block and then bailed from the car - I just Night Vale'd the report up a little.
** Away From Keyboard

I have ideas

Like, I have ideas for NaNoWriMo already. This is so dumb.

I want to do this biopunk/spy thing for it. I'm not sure exactly what I want to do but there's so many story ideas in that combination that I just... yeah.

Shorter post because I have been up all night eating pizza and cookies, writing, and watching Markiplier and co. play Drunk Minecraft and as such I am a little loopy and having a lot of feelings about Harry Potter. #RavenclawPride

So. I hope everyone has a very, very good September. I think I'm getting my writing bug back and I just hope that it sticks around for a while now. Maybe that company idea isn't quite so far out of reach.

The story for the AugNo Anthology is done and sent (I would have loved some confirmation but I don't think I had any the year before last and everything was fine so, yeah). I'll be loading some of that (like a preview) onto the site here fairly soon and that should help me feel like things are a little more completed - like I'm actually getting somewhere. I'm looking for that site - and the company - to go live in 2014 so... wish me luck on that.

I've noticed that Writer's New Year (kind of like Chinese New Year?) doesn't seem to happen on the first of the calendar year. Instead, it happens on the first of November. Save the date and make your resolutions.

So, yeah, I'll be updating the projects in the sidebar here pretty soon (probably not too long after this post goes up) to reflect SeptNoWriMo, which you can find [here], and my goals for that. I'm excited and tired and a little hungry... and almost lonely. And I'm just not sure what I'm feeling right now so...

Bye for now, everyone. Get back to work, fellow WriMos~ And I will see you all in the next update.