Imperial Witch.

Здравствуйте!

terra — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 06:00:03 GMT

So, I've been taking Russian, thus keeping up the liberal arts major spirit of total impracticality. I'm still at that awful "learning the alphabet" stage. It's worse, because I've previously studied Greek, which means that I want to read most of the letters like their Greek counterparts (similarly to how I pronounce all non-English languages with a terrible French accent.) This usually works, but the н is tripping me up, I keep wanting it to be η!! And it turns out that one of those letters is a vowel, and one of them sounds like the English letter n.

I've also been doing a fair bit of work at vigils, the graphics/layout/fic/identity crisis community I established on a whim at DW. I've coded two layouts for DW so far, and am quite pleased with how easy it is to style it!! My next goal is to successfully submit an official style and make out like a mad usertoken bandit.

The other thing is that I have been all football football football basically this whole season but especially last Saturday when Alex Smith became some awesome and terrible spiral-ball throwing force, but only in the last five minutes. We shall see this weekend how many minutes of intense staring and wasted passes it will take him to go super saiyan. And because when I like things I inevitably start trolling the internets for more information, here is a super-interesting article about the integration of the NFL in the early 1960s.

A story about Portland, OR

terra — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 20:39:49 GMT

I was recounting this tale recently and decided it needed to be framed and hung on my internet wall.

'Twas brilling, and I had just purchased a copy of Breaking Dawn and was thus feeling self-superior by comparison. Walking down from the bookstore towards the bus stop, hands gripped on twiny shopping-bag handles, I encountered a man and his companion. The man was a large, round sort with spiked hair and traces of black lipstick. The woman was wearing cat ears.

Quoth the man, rather loudly, "I'm not a furry, I'm just a fetishist." This, by the way, transpired in close proximity to the NC-17 sometimes hentai theater downdown.

Then my bus came, and never did the warm bosom of public transportation seem so welcoming.

enter the electric guitar

terra — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 01:28:39 GMT

Internet update: my internet does work most of the time, but it cuts out for random periods and I'm not sure what is going on, there. Comcast is the only thing I can get at my apartment complex, though, so, I'm pretty much stuck with it,

In other news: this might be the best youtube video of all time.

Water, water!

terra — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 20:37:03 GMT

Internet access...disappearing...

Sending distress singnal...from across...a Gymboree...

60% off...mini-dresses for toddlers...

Send Vitamin water...am inexplicably addicted to it...even though it is just watered down gatorade...

Edit: which is to say, Comcast decided the internet shouldn't work at my apartment, o woe terrible and great.

Yea, I am today lacking in inspiration

terra — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 04:09:11 GMT

So this is a pretty silly post for purposes of memes. Personally, I blame Isaac Newton.

Take a picture of yourself as you are. Don't edit it, don't stop to put on makeup, just photo cap you RIGHT THIS SECOND!!

Most noticeable: I am not, in fact, a dude.

get to know me
I guess on that note, I finally put up an FAQ/extended profile of sorts because I really meant to do it a long time ago. Also, my s key has disappeared from my keyboard. It came loose and fell off, just like a tooth, but I expect if I put it under my pillow I'll only get a billing statement. Shenanigans.

How to get your girlfriend to read comics!!

terra — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 02:31:47 GMT

So those of you who, for whatever sordid and nerdy reason, read Marvel previews catalogs, might have noticed something. Something with boobs. For those of you who don't read the Marvel previews catalog (and I mean who does that that would be sordid and nerdy) I recreate a page for you below, behind a flist cut of some sort.

Now, I've already had men patiently explain to me that a female creator anthology is sexist and wrong and means that females are being forced into a ghetto. A ghetto of GIRLS!! (Where cooties must surely reign.) I admit a female fronted major event for the sake of a female fronted major event makes me a bit skeptical, because let's be honest: it's a major event, and that can't be good. But I'm willing to reserve my cries of righteous indignation and flaunting of my oppressed minority status until I get more than a one sentence blurb. I'm also not unaware that all of the key players in Siege, as identified by the "Origins of" special, are 100% white men, unless we're giving Loki shapeshifter credit. That and Blackest Night is featuring an "Ex-Girlfriends in Supremely Practical Space Swimsuits" corps. Maybe I shouldn't think about this too much, as this isn't what this post is about.

But as I was reading this interview with Marjorie Liu about the Women of Marvel promotion (warning: link leads to IGN and may therefore produce spontaneous rage) I was struck by one of her pretty well articulated points.

So when you ask whether or not the "Women of Marvel" comics are a step in the right direction, I don't know how to answer that except to say, of course, I think it's wonderful -- so that those outside the industry realize there's already a strong female presence.

And that's just it. There are already vaginas in your comics. Women do read superhero books, and they aren't a foreign language that needs to be taught very carefully to anyone lacking a Y chromosome. Women don't have any trouble identifying with male characters: if they did, they'd be pretty well out of luck across the fictional spectrum. Women may have trouble identifying with Greg Land drawings, but that's something else entirely. But the point most blatant marketing ploys miss out on is, well, that the medium itself isn't inherently sexist, and you don't really need to change comics/videogames/whatever to include more shopping and cooking and boys or whatever that mysterious xx ingredient is that will make women finally understand.

But fan culture is hostile to new readers of all kinds, even when new readers are desperately needed for business to continue as usual. This is where I draw on my own singular experience: not trying to speak for everyone with girlparts ever. But comic shops, I've found, are not always female friendly places, and the internet itself is littered with sandwich-making demands. If you ask the question: are comics sexist?, you're liable to spark almost as much rage as Bendis retconning Wanda. I've been told in polite tones that I should "celebrate" the fact that women even exist at all in comics, because, you know, it's unreasonable to expect them to make up half of the fictional population. (I know I can't think of a real society comprised of approximately 50% females!!) But, uh, here, lemme quote from a recent discussion I had with a guy about comics and sexism!!

I don't know about that. And for a thread about sexism towards women that was quite sexist towards men. Most women I know don't get into Cap, Iron Man, or Thor. They do like the X-Men. Especially since it went all crazy. ( I honestly don't care about Pixie, Dazzler, or Psylocke going shopping yet that's what's there) Men generally relate better to heroes than women. And heroes are what sell Marvel's books.

To be fair though, the reason that 90% of the time women are not effective leaders as men is because they get to wrapped up in stuff emotionally. That's the most women's psychology... I'm just saying that most women who come under intense stress become emotional and a develop fractious mind set where they don't always make the most logical decisions. Not all, but most. Therefore it makes sense that Phoenix, Wanda, Storm, and She-Hulk all flipped out if they are being written as women are most of the time. The difference is that their "flipping out" was amplified due to their powers.

My response to that was: "So, do Asian people have a special bone structure that makes them better able to do martial arts?" I then think I said something along the lines of "we inherit a continuity from times when sexism was obviously pervasive: you can't say it's just fate that the characters we've got left over from the golden age are by and large white men." This resulted in:

It's only a problem if you make it a problem. Maybe women should stop whining so much.

That was when I figured everything out. If women didn't complain about sexism, it wouldn't exist! The reason most women don't read comics isn't the mainstream fanboy stigma. It's not that comic fans themselves perpetuate gross and offensive stereotypes. It's that women have tiny, over-emotional brains that can't comprehend real heroes. After all, the hammer is Thor's penis: how could a female possibly understand something as deep and nuanced as two people punching each other. It's out of my vocabulary, but I appreciate the mansplanation.

The truth is, there are many places on the internet where comments like those would have resulted in a righteous smackdown, but not on this particular comicbook forum. Women have safe spaces, but there are still large swaths of internet nerd culture that hold to the golden rule of tits or gtfo. But I can't help but think that this Women in Marvel promotion, even if atrociously handled, could be a positive if it'll get certain segments of the population to realize that women have already infiltrated. They are reading your Captain America comics and getting their emotions all over them, and some of them have already made Steve and Tony gay for each other. If you make ridiculous generalizations, I will post them in my livejournal and you will be mocked retroactively. Because I am pretty sure retcons are the elemental weakness of comics fans. If a woman can't even buy the comics she's written without getting asked if they're for her boyfriend, I don't think editorial is our final boss.

I regret that I'm not loud, I regret that I'm not offensive, I regret that I don't give idiots a piece of my mind when it's what they deserve. Because I can't make Marvel publish the Foggy Nelson: Werewolf Hunter ongoing that features in my wildest fantasies, or make sure Namor always wears as little clothing as possible. But I can tell idiots on the internet exactly why they're idiotic, and even if it won't register through their preternaturally thick skulls, I'll at least have the satisfaction of knowing stuff like this didn't go unchallenged. Because that's the scary thing: it often does.

Meanwhile, in a less serious post!!

Hail, traveler, and hello.

terra — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 03:14:55 GMT

Hi, internet person. You seem to have found my livejournal. Let's learn some neat things about it!

This is a personal journal, but only in the sense that I use it for personal purposes. It's not the place where I talk about my feelings, aside for occasional fangirl rage. My transcendental poetry about my dream experiences as a rare past-life werewolf are locked to me and me alone. It's not quite a fandom journal, as I participate in fandom with alarming irregularity and a reckless abandon, but, it is pretty close. Basically: this is my space, I post what I like. Most content isn't friends-locked, so you can get an idea of what's typical by browsing.

My fandoms are weird and you probably don't share all of them, and that is a-okay. I dabble, and sometimes I'll post about a certain thing once and then you'll never hear about the topic ever again. I love books: I have a soft spot for the English romantics and enjoy picturing them hunting vampires or perhaps starring in a fighting game of some sort. Tom Jones is probably my ideal work of literature, so clearly, my superpower is to leap terrifying pagecounts in a single bound. Sometimes I watch TV. I also have a love of Top Chef and other reality cooking programming. Things can always uses more foam. I'm a gamer. Generally, JRPGs of flavors various and sundry, but I've also been known to whip out the Age of Empires and rock the Byzantines all night long!! I experience many genres of videogame, really. Also, to complete my nerd level up and place the +5 crown of basement-dwelling on my head, I also read comics. I actively follow the Marvel Universe, I keep tabs on certain DCU peeps, and I read a lot of gritty crime grit grit comics with swearing and boobs.

I also treat history as though it were a fandom. My longterm boyfriend is the Early American Republic, but recent affairs include the long nineteenth century, the world wars, and the Norman Conquest. Me and the Early Republic? We're in an open relationship.

I make websites sometimes, and am the devious personality behind valiantknife.org. I am also the Alex that ran astarael.net, antigone.nu, and you might remember that if you are my internet stalker. (Internet stalker, please call me later, I've always wanted your autograph!)

Fandom participation can be found @ thespoils, my fic and icon community.

Basically, if you think a crossover between Twilight and Final Fantasy IV would be spectacular and completely fitting, this is probably a good journal to follow. If you want to speculate about what the livejournal alias of Thomas Jefferson would be, and whether Madison is really just his sockpuppet, this is also a good journal! Occasionally I dabble in some good old-fashioned pop-culture meta-commentary. But the internet is a silly place, and à Rome, fait comme les Romains.

So let's bust out that EFF AE CUE:

Can I friend you?
You can friend anyone, mysterious questioner, myself included! This isn't a coolkids only table, and I will most likely add you back.

Do I, uh, have to say anything?
If you want to drop me a line by commenting on this post, it'd be appreciated, because I like to know who's lurking about. But no, you don't have to. I'll almost always add you back regardless. The criteria for being my friend is generally wanting to be my friend.

Do you post anything friends locked?
Aye, thar be friends only content at this here journal. Possibly in imaginary pirate dialect. But it's mostly along the same lines of what you find posted here public, and locked posts are pretty rare.

Where is your layout from?
It's a stylesheet I modified from one of spire's. Yeah, I did some fiddling around in the S2 layers, and in the process I might have accidentally summoned a triple-mouthed beast from beyond the twelfth veil. Though I am fluent in HTML and CSS, I don't generally make my LJ customizations available. If there's enough interest, maybe someday, but it ain't my bag.

What is this I don't even.

terra — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 20:13:01 GMT

I've decided that I shall have to track down quipquipquip and force Suikoden III on her like a venereal disease. She will probably fall asleep before we get to the good parts.

***

But for the important part of this post!! I decided for one of my resolutions I am going to try to read more books, because I've fallen out of the habit. So help me, Flist-wan Kenobi!! Vous êtes ma seule espérance!! Give me book recommendations.

I will try any book once: I am a loose woman of literature. But, here's a helpful list, of like, ideas. Feel free to ignore and just recommend that book you recommend to everybody. You know the one.

Left to my own devices I will pick Novels of a Certain Length that usually predate Hemingway. I revel in verbosity and grandiose yet impractical sentence structure. This makes me feel smart.

I will also read anything if it has a vampire in it.

Non-fiction is A++ I like me some popular history, and sometimes I even read philosophy and it doesn't feel like arguing with a needy child. (In the way conversing with philosophy majors often does.) BUT YES, I love books, not just novels.

Is there a ship? Are funny nautical hats involved? These omens bode well.

I like most genres, but hard sci-fi is generally not my thing. There are always exceptions!!

ASSASSIN PRIESTS, always a winner.

I like my high fantasy like my Final Fantasy: with lots of backstabbing and set in Ivalice. I am more about the political drama than the high magic or randomass invented languages. Or dragons Dragons are silly. Yes I know why haven't I read a Song of Ice and Fire.

I'm fully capable of reading a book for the prose and not the plot.

Also: cats are cute.

SOME COMPLAINTS

terra — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:33:02 GMT

1) It's very hot outside but the cat is large and warm and also he really wants to sit in people's laps. Perhaps he is senile. Has he not realized how it is hot outside and that people are also hot and that he is covered in fur?

2) I made the mistake of watching a Top Chef marathon and now I crave well-cooked meat with a side dish of fancymcfrenchcookingingredient. Meanwhile, my own culinary skills condemn me to a future of noodle bowl after microwavable noodle bowl.

3) I also started watching Avatar again, and I'm not really sure why, but for some reason every time I like Zuko (which really is most of the time) I get angry at myself for being a a fangirl cliché.

In this negative spirit, I give you!!

Name a fandom, and I'll give you the scoop on at least three of my unpopular opinions related to that fandom.

A bad enough dude.

terra — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 23:15:56 GMT

I was tagged for this by quipquipquip: Reply to this meme by yelling "Words!" and I will give you five words that remind me of you. Then post them in your LJ and explain what they mean to you.

➜ Locke I'm not sure I can explain this in any novel way, but Locke is some kind of crazy hair-color-shifting metamorphagus slash my very favorite sixteen bit necrophiliac. I dunno. For me, I've always been quite into the whole dashing rogue archetype. (and the "always been" statement here is kind of misleading. As I've sort of been obsessed with Locke since I was like, nine.) But the thing that lets him still be my favorite character is because he's also Woosley-translated pixelated deconstruction of the archetype. His story is about how heroic quests can destroy a person, the selfish side of selfishness. Plus, you know, he has a key part in an opera stopped by a giant, punning, octopus.

➜ Ankle Wings Idk, Namor has ankle wings, I am not sure what part of this needs explaining. They are wings, and they are on his ankles. They actually do help him fly because when they get messed up he kind of hovers around lopsided. The more you know!!

➜ Renn Fayre This is a party my college has at the end of the year where, uh, people dress up in funny costumes (or nothing) and get pretty drunk. It has nothing to do with the Renaissance!! Instead there are various themes that often have little to do with academics and/or historical costuming. One time the theme was Ziggy Stardust, philosophically and conceptually quite disparate from David Bowie. There's an annual midnight play powered by glowsticks!! Except really again, mostly people just get drunk for three days, eat burritos.

➜ Bucky's friends (since he has them right)

As this panel proves, Bucky does have friends, he is I guess sleeping with them.

➜ Internet notoriety Not sure why this is here, uh, really. I am not sure one can become internet famous for discussing Nash Latkje's shoes, ad nauseam, but I like to think if such a thing were possible I would be the one to achieve it. My opinion on internet notoriety and the courting thereof is pretty much the standard one, I think, in that it's not really worth perusing. Okay, so fandom_wank is a somewhat-but-not-really secret-pleasure of mine. But it isn't particularly fun to actually be embroiled in the drama, and I've been on the internet long enough to have actually figured that out from experience. But my philosophy of internet is something that'd probably take more than a paragraph to explain, and I'm not sure even quipquipquip is interested.

Oh, and my horrific experiment in manga coloring has ended!! There are surprisingly few shots of Nash's shoes in the manga, alas.

More pictures of my cat!!

terra — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 19:02:38 GMT

I found the my other cat, Smoke, sleeping on my bed yesterday. He's a skittish cat, so he's hard to get pictures of, but because he was still sleepy, I a few nicer shots of him. Okay, not great, but we've learned that cats and cameras are mutually incomprehensible.

Smoke and Kit-Kat are brothers, so they look a lot the same. I still want to name a cat Franco-Prussian war. I imagine it would be a great conversation starter.

The other thing I've been doing is slowly coloring in panels of the Suikoden III manga so I can have Nash icons. Observe! Though really, having embarked on this quest, I've mostly decided it isn't worth the time and effort. I'm too stubborn to stop, really, until I get all the icons I want, but I don't understand how some talented people out there make whole batches of colored icons on a regular basis.

I, too, can be shallow.

terra — Fri, 29 May 2009 01:13:56 GMT

First things first, I finally put a new layout up at terra. It's based off one of spire's, which was in turn based off the layout at typesites. It's also based of, y'know, Opal, which would be a nice style if everything weren't wrong with it ever. And by everything, I mean the sidebar. I'm probably going to fiddle around with it some, and maybe even see if I can get custom comments pages to work without nesting, &c, but that is a job for another romantic afternoon spent in the company s2howto.

But, on the subject of layouts!! As I was saying to whisperwords, font like this is impossible to read, so don't do it. Unless you're trying to level up in illegible or you are James Bond and don't want the Communists intercepting your coded messages, there's no reason for your layouts to be impossible to read. So stop doing it, 99% of layout communities.

So a while back tienslemonde gave me some stuff that reminded her of me to explain. That's the kind of meme this is. Sam gave me:

→ Final Fantasy VI Basically I really like Final Fantasy VI, if you've spoken with me for moments you have probably caught on. Further fact!! My username here is from a Final Fantasy VI character. Shocking. I don't know, it's my favorite game, and over time I've grown to love most things about it, including you know, the not-so-good parts. The setting gets me, I love Amano's artwork, it, um, has Locke in it. It's a game where a multi-part opera sequence with shifting points of view and costumed high theatrics can be derailed by a giant talking octopus. That's just how it rolls.

→ obscure comic book canons I don't even think any of the comics I read are that obscure, they just aren't all Young Avengers or Runaways ~~or OOC buttsex~~ so livejournal fandom is therefore nonexistent. But there are totally other people who read Ex Machina. Real comic book snobs don't buy crap from DC and Marvel and their comics come in intricate Chris Ware anthologies with depressing pop-out inserts.

→ cats I love my cats, and all other cats. They have pointy ears and their noses are tiny.

→ donuts This brings up one of Sam's major faults, namely, that she is British, and for some reason relating to that Britishness wouldn't believe that donuts are a breakfast food. But they are a breakfast food and I enjoy consumning them as such!! Really, our right to eat fried doughcake at any tie of the day seems more well-remembered than much of the actual Constitution.

→ fic I'm secretly this horrible fanfic elitist who sometimes goes to fanficrants to troll herself, because every time I go there I manage to find something that makes me want to claw my eyes from my sockets like so many shitty references to Greek mythology. I'm not elitist in the way I think most fanfic writers are-- it's not technical elitism. I mean, I don't cheer for misplaced semi-colons, or the absence of semi-colons altogether, but grammar is the small stuff. Words have ways of fitting together; if you can't string an attractive sentence the oxford comma will do you no good. On top of that most of my fandoms are near non-existent, I like gen, and I don't think touching a book written by SMeyer means your brains will spontaneously leak out your ears. I sort of like to picture myself afloat in a sea of poorly characterized hurt/comfort fic, my knuckles gone white around my only paddle. There is no food in this ocean. Two weeks ago I ate Clippy, my only companion, but his formatting tips can only sustain me for so long.

Also, I bought a McFlurry today and the ice cream in it isn't melting like normal ice cream. I'm kind of creeped out.

It was a social experiment.

terra — Wed, 27 May 2009 21:42:19 GMT

So, uh, hi.

Apologies for not posting for however many months. I got pretty caught up in working on my thesis and that got me generally unmotivated to post here, which was really really lame of me, but it's over and now I am done with school and all that. And I really do want to post here, now, and be back and do stupid internet things ++ level up in nerd and all that fun stuff.

Plus you know, the giant red Rambaldi ball ate me on the way to its strange cameo in the Star Trek movie. J.J. Abrams, you are not sly enough for me. What's that?? a distraction from my lame 6-month failure?? Could it be--

His name is Kit-kat. He is old and grumpy and does not like to pose for pictures. I fear he will never be famous on the internet. :( And now my black shirt is covered in his hair...

Also I decided to archive/post my fic and icons and stuff at a community-- thespoils. This way no one will be subjected to that horror unless they bring it on themselves.

ALSO ALSO I have a dreamwidth here and I couldn't register "terra" because it was already taken but I think I tried to add all of you even if that didn't work out so well. So, uh, that.

The earth says hello!

terra — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:43:02 GMT

So hi there livejournal, this is an official posting of I'M BACK from hiatus and finals and generally the ends of the earth. Thank you guys so much for your comments on this post, it really meant a lot to me.

That, uh, doesn't mean I have anything interesting to report other than that. Except I'm 23 today? And my brother bought me Chrono Trigger DS? Happy birthday to daemon and PETER PETRELLI as well.

Creative Avoidance of Court and Convent

terra — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 00:52:39 GMT

So I just saw a crumb of chocolate cake on my bed. And I tried to eat it, enjoying chocolate as I do.

Except, actually, it was lint.

THIS POST BROUGHT TO YOU BY FINALS WEEK, DECEMBER 08

Further updates when I finally understand what happens in La Princesse de Clèves, and can explain it in terms that would make the SAT Verbal weep.

Hmmmm.

terra — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:23:54 GMT

So somebody just sent me flaming poo.

Mysterious.

Oh, just damn you all.

terra — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 04:55:44 GMT

He certainly saved America from an awful fate.

terra — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:22:27 GMT

Hey I don't have anything new to report or any interesting observations or anything, so instead I will post scans of things I have not really drawn recently. Boss!

So, rinnia is letting me adopt the Terra fanlisting, and I'm trying to make a layout with my own art. Behold!

I drew Jason Todd for dreadable (happy birthday!) and colored it in really quick? Mostly including this so I can use the tentacles tag again. :D

AND NOW FOR RANDOM THINGS SCANNED FROM MY NOTES:

Locke and Celes, because really, who do you take me fore here?

Random sketches!

Valvalis!

Random sketches! Now with more androgynous!

Super random Lezard, who knows what is wrong with his hair.

TO MY PROFESSORS: yes, this is what I am doing in your classes. O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

And, stolen from paperclipchains because I really want to talk about shipping for some strange reason:

a) I want to talk about how my ships and concept of shipping varies with fandom, so name a fandom and I'll discuss what I ship and what shipping means to me in that fandom.

b) I have a lot of fandoms. (No kidding!) Have you ever wondered about one of the fandom I sometimes mention on my journal which you don't know of? Ask me any question you want about them!

EDIT: GODDAMN IT 18th CENTURY PRINTING, why are you so hard to read??

I am as I ever was, and ever shall be

terra — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 02:26:41 GMT

I decided I would make a post in the form of letters to different people.

Now for some EXTREME JUSTICE!!

terra — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 23:54:29 GMT

I was scanning some things for the pleasure of dreadable, and this, flist, is my gift to you.

No, I don't understand why people add me either.

I decided to add a picture of the ridiculously awesome new hat I am wearing.

My expression is kind of deer-in-headlightsish but whatever. Mmmm, hat.

So, Andrew Jackson, we meet again.

terra — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 08:30:14 GMT

So one thing I have been doing these past few weeks is watching Heroes.

So the first thing is, I have pretty little faith in Heroes, just as a whole, but I thought I could count on at least one thing.

WHAT IS THIS, NBC?? WHY ARE YOU MAKING MOHINDER UN-HOT!! I DON'T UNDERSTAND!! YOU KNOW, PEOPLE ARE DYING IN AFRICA!! AND THIS MAKING MOHINDER UN-HOT WILL DO NOTHING TO SAVE THEM. NOTHING.

Okay, um, moving along.

Oh, you're sly, Heroes. I never would have expected that there could be a secret Petrelli. Not at all. Why are you so wily?? Teach me the ways of deception!!

I guess he took Claire's other power, too.

Speaking of incest:

Oh, Weevil, I liked you until you had Peter Petrelli inside.

I don't even care if they spend the next twelve episodes locked in a random room and advancing the plot at a rate of 5mm/hour I will still totally love Hiro and Ando.

Also, Nathan has confused himself with Mitchell Hundred. (Congrats to the .6% of my flist to understand this reference!!) But it's okay, I don't mind the religious crazy or the regular crazy, so long as it gives him something morally ambiguous to do.

But still, Heroes, you need to work on your racial stereotypes. Hello there, random tribal guardian painting rocks in the desert!!

It should go without saying that the episodes where everyone gets killed in the alternate future are always my favorite.

Especially, when they involve THIS:

YES DAVID ANDERS YESSSSSS, I don't even care if he's only been gone for what three episodes. Also: Jack Bristow could totally school Noah Bennet. Search your feelings, you know it to be true!

Because what are my posts without an unnecessary crossover. I ask you, who would win in the epic Peter v. Seifer angst-off?? Heaven or hell, let's rock!

IN OTHER NEWS: I will soon be making an appearance in Dissidia.

My school hosted a lecture by Art Spiegelman which I attended. He mostly covered things I already knew about (with my ninja pretension skillz which clearly do not say anything about my artistic merits [or do they??]) but he did it in an interesting way and also talked about a lot of his personal experiences + influences as a cartoonist. Plus, he mentioned how he disliked the term "graphic novel" so hey, one for my corner.

Also, I got a job!! It was pretty much my ideal job-- making minor edits to the school website for an exorbitant hourly sum. But the application process was intimidating. I had to submit three or four different documents, and also go in and interview. The lady said that she would let me know by five o'clock on Friday at the latest, so when I didn't get a reply back by Friday evening I assumed she gave it to one of the other candidates. BUT, this morning she emailed me offering me the position. This calls for an update to the scoreboard kids:

ALEX: 3.6 WORLD: 129312 EDWARD CULLEN: -2

The home team might not be winning, but we're putting up a good fight.

Just call me Alexander Catiline, baby.

terra — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 23:16:56 GMT

Dear wanderlight:

I don't really know how to tell you this, but I'm in love with your sister. I think I realized it when I changed tennis shoes at the mental hospital and I saw you carve your initials into the crazy monk. I'm sure you're frostbitten enough to understand that Extreme Home Makeover sucks. I'm returning your ring to you, but I'll keep your photo as a memory. You should also know that I get sick when I think of hating the Boston Celtics.

With ease,
terra

It's matsu's fault. But isn't it always?? Isn't it always??

RULES:
Do the "Letter MEME". ~~Tag no less than 5 other people~~ Then copy the "How-to" Letter Meme, and finish your Journal entry.

-> How you do the Letter Meme:

Dear (the last person who left a comment on your journal):

I don't really know how to tell you this, but ___1___. I think I realized it ___2___ ___3___ and I saw you ___4___ ___5___. I'm sure you're ___6___ enough to understand ___7___. I'm returning ___8___ to you, but I'll keep ___9___ as a memory. You should also know that I ___10___ ___11___ .

___12___,
-Your name-

1. What's the color of your shirt?
Blue - Our romance is over
Red - Our affair is over
White - I'll join the monastery
Black - I dislike you
Green - Our horoscope doesn't match
Grey - You're a pervert
Yellow - I'm selling myself
Pink - Your nostrils are insulting
Brown - The mafia wants you
No shirt - You're a loser
Other - I'm in love with your sister

2. Which is your birth month?
January - That night
February - Last year
March - When your dwarf bit me
April - When I tripped on sesame seeds
May - First of May
June - When you put cuffs on me
July - When I threw up
August - When I saw the shrunken head
September - When we skinny dipped
October - When I quoted Santa
November - When your dog ran amok
December - When I changed tennis shoes

3. Which food do you prefer?
Tacos - In your apartment
Pizza - In your camping car
Pasta - Outside of Chicago
Hamburgers - Under the bus
Salad - As you ate enchilada
Chicken - In your closet
Kabob - With Paris Hilton
Fish - In women's clothing
Sandwiches - At the Hare Krishna graduation
Lasagna - At the mental hospital
Hot dog - Under a state of trance
None of the above - With George Bush and his wife

4. What's the color of your socks?
Yellow - Hit on
Red - Insult
Black - Ignore
Blue - Knock out
Purple - Pour syrup on
White - Carve your initials into
Grey - Pull the clothes off
Brown - Put leeches on
Orange - Castrate
Pink - Pull the toupee off
Barefoot - Sit on
Other - Drive out

5. What's the color of your underwear?
Black - My best friend
White - My father
Grey - Bill Clinton
Brown - My fart balloon
Purple - My mustard soufflé
Red - Donald Duck
Blue - My avocado plant
Yellow - My penpal in Ghana
Orange - My Kid Rock-collection
Pink - Manchester United's goalkeeper
None - My John F. Kennedy-statue
Other - The crazy monk

6. What do you prefer to watch on TV?
Scrubs - Man
O.C. - Emotional
One Tree Hill - Open
Heroes - Frostbitten
Lost - High
House - Scarred
Simpsons - Cowardly
The news - Mongolic
Idol - Masochistic
Family Guy - Senile
Top Model - Middle-class
None of the above - Ashamed

7. Your mood right now?
Happy - How awful I've felt
Sad - How boring you are
Bored - That Santa doesn't exist
Angry - That your pimples are at the last stage
Depressed - That we're cousins
Excited - That there is no solution to this.
Nervous - The middle-east
Worried - That your Honda sucks
Apathetic - That I did a sex-change
Ashamed - That I'm allergic to your hamster
Cuddly - That I get turned on by garbage men
Overjoyous - That I'm open
Other - That Extreme Home Makeover sucks

8. What's the color of your walls in your bedroom?
White - Your ring
Yellow - Your love letters
Red - Your Darth Vader-poster
Black - Your tame stone
Blue - The couch cushions
Green - The pictures from LA
Orange - Your false teeth
Brown - Your contact book
Grey - Our matching snoopy-bibs
Purple - Your old lottery coupons
Pink - The cut toenails
Other - Your memories from the military service

9. The first letter of your first name?
A/B - Your photo
C/D - The oil stocks
E/F - Your neighbour Martin
G/H - My virginity
I/J - The results of your blood-sample
K/L - Your left ear
M/N - Your suicide note
O/P - My common sense
Q/R - Your mom
S/T - Your collection of butterflies
U/V - Your criminal record
W/X - David's tricot outfits
Y/Z - Your grades from college

10. The last letter in your last name?
A/B - Always will remember
C/D - Never will forget
E/F - Always wanted to break
G/H - Never openly mocked
I/J - Always have felt dirty before
K/L - Will tell the authorities about
M/N - Told in my confession today about
O/P - Was interviewed by the Times about
Q/R - Told my psychiatrist about
S/T - Get sick when I think of
U/V - Always will try to forget
W/X - Am better off without
Y/Z - Never liked

11. What do you prefer to drink?
Water- Our friendship
Beer - Senility
Soft drink - A new life as a clone
Soda - The incarnation as an eskimo
Milk - The apartment building
Wine - Cocaine abuse
Cider - A passionate interest for mice
Juice - Oprah Winfrey imitations
Mineral water - Embarrassing rash
Hot chocolate - Eggplant-fetishism
Whisky - To ruin the second world war
Other - To hate the Boston Celtics

12. To which country would you prefer to go on a vacation?
Thailand - Warm regards
USA - Best regards
England - Good luck on your short-term leave from jail
Spain - Go and drown yourself
China - Disgusting regards
Germany - With ease
Japan - Go burn
Greece - Your everlasting enemy
Australia - Greetings to your frog Leonard
Egypt - Fuck off now
France - In pain
Other - Greetings to your freaky family

So I thought I would talk something about what I'm actually doing this year, which is MY THESIS. My thesis is about the use of classical pseudonyms in the newspaper debate over the Jay Treaty. Which is to say, "how the founding fathers insulted each other in print." Like this:

JEFFERSON: That illegitimate wanker Hamilton is trying to destroy the republic with economics, and, like, machines. HE IS TOTALLY A BRITISH SPY. I have PROOF. This one time he came over to my house and was all, "Who the hell is John Locke?" That's right, he doesn't even watch Lost. And then he went on and ON and ON about how much he loved Julius Caesar, which hell-ooooo, didn't that guy totally destroy a republic in order to become a king and wear prettier togas?? We don't want Hamilton wearing any pretty togas.

HAMILTON: You all suck.

I, er, promise not to talk about it too much.

So this weekend one of my friends came up to visit from the Oakland, so I've been hanging out a lot this weekend. We went to Powell's, which is a hu-u-uge bookstore downtown, which you should never let me visit because I buy things.

That would be um, Fun Home, the first volume of Justice League International, Allende's Zorro, Jacques the Fatalist, and The Kestrel!! the_wild_iris knows how excited I am to finally get my hands on it. Lloyd Alexander is one of my all-time favorite authors, and I have the first and last book of the Westmark trilogy but only just now found the middle part.

We also went to go see Don Hertzfeldt, who actually does look a lot like Johnny Depp. He even had a story about being mistaken for Johnny Depp. But yeah, they played most of his most popular stuff plus his newest film, which was heartbreaking.

Also we just hung out at my friends house for a while. This is the cat who lives there:

One game we play a lot that's pretty fun is, the Sentence Game. Which is where someone writes a sentence, passes it on to the next person, and they draw a picture of that sentence. Then they pass it to the next person, who tries to reconstruct the sentence using only that picture, and so on:

Taadaaaaa. Next time I get to illustrate the lovely threesome icor and I will be having with Zombie Argath.

Hello, cliffhangers!

terra — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 05:16:55 GMT

Special salutations to my two newest LJ friends-- comixologist and bornofstars who added me for almost the exact opposite reason. But the inexplicably royal WE is glad that you are here.

Let's play a game!! I'm bored and I haven't really been interacting with you guys as much as of late. Taken from lassarina, who should have married Locke when she had the chance.

Basic rules of the game, if you're unfamiliar: You pick three characters. Any fandom I'm remotely familiar with is good. I then have to choose one of them to screw, one to marry, and one to throw off a cliff.

To make this equally fun on both sides, I will also say that after I've finished explaining my choices, I'll give a set of three back to you. You can then do the same, and we go on like that until one of us gets bored or distracted by something else!

The Egotist Becomes

terra — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 23:56:51 GMT

So look, it's an entire post of pictures I took with my new phone. See! The blackest depths of my bookshelf. Wonder! At the fuzziness of my cat.

Or: I stalk myself so that you don't have to.

I went home last week and took some pictures of my cats. This cat is Kit-Kat.

This cat is Smoke.

More Smoke!! Both my cats are about fifteen, so they're pretty ancient as far as cats go. They also don't understand they should keep still while I try to take a picture of them!

My bed, which is where I sleep. I also have a music stand in front of it, as you can see.

Across from the bed, there is a bookshelf!

All my games and DVDs are in the cupboard underneath the shelf.

Let's get a closer look at the bookshelf!

And then there is a random wall that I need to decorate with more things.

Oh look, another bookshelf.

And then a pile of books next to the bookshelf, because I ran out of book space.

There are more books on my desk, surprise!

My computer is opened to livejournal as labeled.

Close up of my white board, where I have drawn a motivational image. Let's go positive thinking!!

Also on my desk: a scanner, and the comics that I bought this week. (No Runaways, it's the comic shop's fault.)

Underneath my bookshelf, there is more of my nerd equipment.

I took this picture of Shadow Hearts especially for shinyfairylight

Also, for the record, this is what I look like:

DAMN, IT FEELS GOOD TO BE A GANGSTA.

Next time: I continue to blame Benjamin Franklin for most of my personal problems.

Anyway this cake is great! It's so delicious and moist!

terra — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 19:14:00 GMT

So I am still alive, it's just that my computer wasn't quite for a while. And that combined with school starting and me being busy with that, and some family issues I don't really want to talk about, resulted in my M.I.A. stint.

Don't worry though, like the characters on Heroes, all I need to come back is a commercial break.

Last night I went to listen to Obama's chief economic advisor speak on the financial crisis, where I realized I still mostly blame the sub-prime housing crisis on the Red Skull and the cosmic cube. I think maybe college has actually made me stupider.