What ho, friends. Boise is smothered in snow and I am smothered in pensive pondering, wrapped up warm with mind out wandering. Went out for pizza/beer/snowball fights last night and had a blast -- otherwise the week has been a little mad. Mad in some good ways, too, so there's that.
Guys.
Guys.
I miss my drawing laptop ;_;
Do you hear me say now
Love ain't far
Well I didn't mind, I didn't mind, I didn't mind
Amazing things are going down in the world, as always. Things I've run across recently include fucking comet landings, and also this kickass project to photograph some of the oldest living things on the planet.
Oh man, so many things to post. First off, between the following and The Slow Regarding of Silent Things: HOLY CRIPES THERE IS DELICIOUS BOOK-CANDY
Hot damn.
They were released on the same day, apparently, but we must have gotten Gibson in late or something -- I walked past them the other day and did a dead stop because holy shit yes more William Gibson have I mentioned I really love William Gibson.
This picture is but a crude and base shadow of how this sunset actually looked in person. D...dawg.
Aw crap
In anime news, I cannot fucking recommend Gugure! Kokkuri-san enough. It is amazing and hilarious.
KOHINA-CHAN IS THE BESSSST.
Hey so I was playing around with freebie apps and found some crazy stuff are you ready foooorrrrrr
NINJA ASSASSIN ROMANCE ADVENTURES
So the first game is basically your standard choose-your-own-romance-story. They give your character a little intro where you, some young thing in old timey Japan, get stuffed in a floor by your parents when your dad's dirty cop boss rolls in to frame your dad for smuggling -- and of course murders the crap out of them for "knowing too much". Once the intro finishes it's time to name our plucky young orphan.
"We're not smugglers! That is a discriminatory rumor! MY PARENTS ARE DEEEEAD"
Stricken, young Vengeance wanders the streets. Passing an alley she witnesses a second (ninja) murder, and muses about some vigilantes for hire she heard about somehow. Taking her monies to a shrine where the vigilantes might be, she attempts to cast Summon Ninja briefly before courageously giving up entirely.
Suddenly someone grabs her! Happy Murder day! Have some more trauma!
I cannot explain how non-reassuring this is and I shouldn't have to.
Congratulations, you have been abducted by ninjas.
They want you to join their ninja group, oh and they threaten to kill you if you leave. Maybe they're joking. Are they? The sole survivor of the McSmuggles family thus swears to devote her life to the band of sexy ninjas who have abducted her. I'm not even making this shit up.
Eventually the game (and your captors) offer you a choice of partner(/watchdog?)/romantic interest. They basically stick you with someone because you're a homeless waif/abductee and they all have jobs around town to cover for their ninja-doin's. You can't pick Boss Ninja, but you can choose Fake-cop McStraightman, Dark/Secret-History Hair Guy (not kidding, his cover is as a hairdresser), Prettyboy Moneybags von Angstypast, Doctor Guy, and Ice-Cold Book Guy. I clicked Book Guy first because I thought he was a lady option, and then my hopes were trampled into pulp. Let's take a look, shall we?
MY DISLIKE IS WOMAN
Yikes. How could we choose anyone else? I mean, as long as we have a train wreck here, let's keep feeding it that sweet high-octane tsundere gasoline why not.
In such a tweest! it's revealed that the ninja you caught out a-murdering was, in fact, Book Guy. Your ninja troupe decides to stick you with him as punishment, despite his cries about how much he hates woman. On the walk back to Book Guy's house where (obviously) Vengeance lives now, she sort of gives a shit about her family dying before contemplating how lucky she is to have been kidnapped by attractive men who can murder her.
Is this just (a really fucked up) fantasy?
Ok, I guess Book Guy has one perk:
Go onnnnn....
Ooooh, a misogynist and an author! Wait until I tell my dead parents!
Since Book Guy hates woman so much, he basically avoids you while secretly growing fond of you at his library where you are employed by him and also expected to cook him dinner. Since you're stupid (and, I guess, since you're now owned by ninjas) you don't make a break for it while out getting groceries, but are instead cornered by some rich asshole who tries to re-abduct you for his very own.
Well I'll give you that one, Mister.
You're literally about to just allow yourself be dragged off by this guy (he starts to walk off and gosh, he told you to follow him and now he's walking away what should you do), when obviously you are rescued from Alpha-Creep's creepy grasp (and your own stupidity) by Book Guy. He barks little, yappy ninja barks at Alpha-Creep -- who chuckles and wanders off -- before turning to tsundere at you a bunch.
I know it's not a verb, but it should be.
I didn't finish the story, but... can you blame me? I may still go back and see if I can squeeze more funny screenshots out of it, but we'll see what my tolerance levels are at.
Yes it is Robot Waifu Dress Up. Yes I am pathetic. LOOK HOW KAWAII THOUGH @O@
O...only if you want to bby @o@
Yes my name is Oneechan. YES I AM PATHETIC.
HUMAN ENTERTAINMENT *WINK*
I got a background built her a library fit for a queen. She has amazing taste in books, sings for a death metal band, and spends her nights tagging shit around town b/c my waifu don't give no fucks. Except about dust.
DUST!!! D:
But that's ok, baby; dusting's my job.
Shut up.
There's a feature which lets your robot "socialize" with other players' robots and... you get some real gems.
There was also a cafe event where you walked around trying to find customers and make food for them.
Also, a feature where you can visit another user's room and trick their robot by putting different clothes on them
Maybe?
S...she also writes me poetry @0@
***B-B-B-B-BONUS COSTUMES***
that you probably don't care about
@u@
DON'T WORRY. The books aren't in danger from the fire, it's just paper and LEDs
Customer: Hey do you have any books by Peter Beagle
Me: Oh, The Last Unicorn is over here and the graphic novel is-
Customer: He's going to be in town tonight
Me: ARE YOU SHITTING ME
A lot of people are going to recognize that as a movie title, but if you've only seen the cartoon, you're missing out. TLU is one of two books whose first line I know by heart (the other is Watership Down), and it reads like poetry a lot of the time.
"The Red Bull could not see him, and would kill him without ever knowing that he had been in the way. Wonder and love and great sorrow shook Schmendrick the Magician then, and came together inside him and filled him, filled him until he felt himself brimming and flowing with something that was none of these. He did not believe it, but it came to him anyway, as it had touched him twice before and left him more barren than he had been. This time, there was too much of it for him to hold: it spilled through his skin, sprang from his fingers and toes, willed up equally in his eyes and his hair and the hollows of his shoulders. There was too much to hold, too much ever to use; and still he found himself weeping with the pain of his impossible greed. He thought, or said, or sang, I did not know that I was so empty, to be so full."
So previous evening plans were cancelled and my brother, who is a saint, drove me to a little movie theater in Meridian so that I, a grown woman, could watch a cartoon about a unicorn for the zillionth time. There was a Q/A section with PSB before the movie started, but I only asked if he was going to be signing things, because freaking out about bittersweet prose and themes about growing old and mortality and impermanence and acceptance and regret...I just, I don't know, I couldn't think of any questions that would help start a discussion about all that, and it didn't seem the proper forum. I figured I'd have a chance to talk to him a little more when he was signing things, so my brother (AGAIN: A SAINT) waited in line with me for an hour afterwards.
WIZARD PLZ
Sorry about the angle -- this awesomely smug Schmendrick picture was next to the table they set up; a table full of SHINY THINGS!
I got some rings (which I might turn into a necklace, since they're kind of large), and a copy of A Fine & Private Place, because I don't own it and haven't read it in a long time. I ALSO WON A STRIP OF FILM IN A RAAAAFFFFLLLLE! (Sorry again about the picture quality)
Love is slowing you down, my lady
I KNOW YOU! I almost knew you as soon as I saw you on the road, coming to my door -- since then, there is no movement of yours that has not betrayed you. A pace, a glance, a turn of the head, the flash of your throat as you breathe, even your way of standing perfectly still -- they were all my spies.
(Extra bonus saint points for my brother, by the way, because yes I did talk along with like the entire fucking movie)
So we finally got to the front of the line and I was all excited and nervous, but I wanted to show him my copy of the book, because I found it at a thrift store and it already had his signature in it, which I thought was cool.
He seemed really tired, though, so when he flipped by the page to sign it on a different one I didn't really speak up even though my inner fangirl was totally losing it about the aforementioned awesome writing and his book touching my life, and all the other fangirl things he has probably heard a million times over. So he signed a different page, but...but...guys.
Him: (tired, signing books, not really talking) Me:(◎_◎;)
Me: (bright red, mumbling) M...my name is Katie
Him: (picks up next book, starts signing it)
Me: ヽ(ﾟДﾟ)ﾉ M...my name is Katie!
Him: Oh, sorry, terribly embarrassing
Me: No no, it's fine, I'm sure you're all very tired! Besafehaveanicetourthankyousomuch!!!!! (flusterly splutters away)
Internal me: (panicked and screaming) OhgodIdidnotmeantoembarrassyouMrBeagleyouaresuchawonderfulauthorIamsosorryIjustwanttotalktoyouabouthowIloveyourwritinganduseofthemesandhowtragicitisthatweallgetoldandhavetoacceptlossandyouarelikeapoetandIjustlovethisbooksomuchIamsosorryIamsoawkwardohgodwhy
(╥_╥)
S...so but at least I got the graphic novel personalized? I really wish I'd gotten a chance/had the ability to talk to him a little bit about the book. D: WHY SO AWKWARD, SELF. WHYYYYY.
YOU GUYS, NO UNICORN WAS EVER BORN WHO COULD REGRET, BUT NOW I DO. I REGRET.
