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"Plagiarism: It's Not Just a Hobby, It's a Way of Life!!"

[May 24, 2003] Well, I'm sure all of my loyal plagiarizers out there have been getting rather irritated with me. See, if I never add any new artwork to my site, they can never add any to theirs, being as they are completely dependent on my own questionable level of talent (it's questionable because I haven't even scratched the surface of what I believe myself capable of doing) in order to parade around and feel as if they actually might have some. But, unfortunately, there is a difference between drawing something, scanning it in, pasting a bunch of artist & copyright info on it and uploading it to your webpage; and going to said webpage, downloading a bunch of pictures, either cropping the image or using the eraser tool liberally to erase all traces of the original artist info, pasting one's name on it, and then putting it in any place where one is in the position of disillusionally saying, "Look at what I did!"

Actually, I'm generalizing a whole lot. The fact of the matter is, I don't usually go traipsing around the Internet in the sorts of places potential plagiarizers are liable to lurk, so I'm pretty much in the dark about them and their eViL habits. However, I'm certain they are out there. I've been plagiarized at least twice to my knowledge: Once by the editor for a certain dinosaur magazine (who redrew one of my dinosaur heads, and with nauseating obviousness, to boot) and once by some nobody at NeoPets.com (who submitted the unicorn sketch I did on lined paper -- remember that? -- at their own entry in some Beauty Contest thing). I 'corrected' the former, but I really have no idea what to do about the latter -- I tried to contact the people at Neopets, but so far I haven't heard back, so I don't know.

Really, it boggles me to no end why anyone would find my stuff worth stealing. Folks tell me that even my sketches are "that good". Sure, I love my artwork, in the sense that it's a part of me. It came from me. As such, I won't really stand to let anyone (besides me) abuse it in any way. And abuse includes stealing.

I really can't understand the mentality behind the people who steal artwork and present it as their own, as their original. Why not just make something that comes from you? By bother with petty deceit? It seems simple enough to me, but, then, I am a person of considerable integrity. Certainly, my artwork is not 100% pure -- like everything else in this world, people are always borrowing from others before them. Such is the essence of inspiration, I should think. Seeing what other people have done inspires my own creative impulses. Gregory S. Paul's dinosaur artwork, long ago, showed me how interesting dinosaurs could be, and for years after I followed in his footsteps as I learned more about dinosaurs and became increasingly able to make my own creative/intellectual decisions about how I wanted to portray them.

That's just one example. It's also nothing new for me to take characters or creatures from the world of fiction and make them "my own" -- put a new spin on their design or put them in new situations. This sort of behavior is hardly restricted to me. Still, I do have the bad habit of being influenced by creations that are still under heavy copyright, so I try to take the necessary precautions whenever parading around with drawings I did influenced by "Final Fantasy VII" or "Neon Genesis Evangelion" -- I'll take credit for the drawings I did, but not for the characters' designs or whatever.

As far as my artwork goes... Being the one who actually draws or paints the stuff, I can't really stand back and think, "Oh my gawd, that is so good! I'm so talented I frighten myself!" No-no-no-no. I like the things I draw, but I can always draw them better. Or, one might say, differently. I can acknowledge my achievements, but there's no point in lurking on them. I strive to go to another level, to learn, to improve. Considering how far I have to go, it boggles me to no end why people would find my stuff worth stealing. Stiil, that's by no means an indication that I think such behavior is permissible. There's no excuse for claiming someone else's work as your own. No excuse.

"You're gonna burn in He11, you fL|cking baby killer!"

[May 16, 2003] L33t's useful when you want to avoid technically swearing, isn't it? (Yes, I know it's TECHNICALLY "1337", but, for crying out loud, 1337 is also a numerical value, so be quiet. L33t purism isn't going to improve the world.) Brownie Points for anyone who knows where the above quote is originally from. ;;>

There was some argument going on at the OverClocked Forums about a bunch of guys taking advantage of pictures of dead aborted fetuses to further their own pro-life cause and how this made them hypocrites and how people should write to this organization and protest en masse. I don't usually browse forums, but it was on the main page when I went to go see what new ReMixes were up, so I read through it, didn't encounter any viewpoints that approached my own, and ended up typing a post for the heck of it. It wouldn't let me post it, for some reason (even though I was logged into the forums), so, rather than waste my efforts, I'll just put the stuff I wrote here and call it a Banter. Convenient, eh?

My comment at the beginning will be confusing -- the last post in the thread had posted a giant image taken from Church of the Subgenius propaganda. If you're not familiar with the Church of the Subgenius.... Look it up in Google if you're interested or else take bliss in your ignorance. If you opt for the former, don't say I didn't warn you.

That said, here's my post, losing almost all of its value in being completely out of context here, but whatever:

Oh dear me. Church of the Subgenius propaganda! Pinks and Normals, it is time for you to quit your jobs and become professional Slackmasters. J.R. Bob Dobbs and his money-making exploits are the only moral guidance you now need!

Forgive me, I just happen to be acquainted with one of the "training tapes" for that organization. It's quite useful for determining the "weirdness threshold" of freshly-made acquaintances.

At any rate, while this is a valid moral argument, I'm afraid I'll end up passing on involvement. The concept of dead partially-developed humanoids being exploited is an issue, but it seems relatively insignificant compared to all of the other stuff that's going on out there. You know, tree-hugging environmental issues, where any action taken towards a resolution benefits everyone on this planet, human or otherwise. There are way too many global catastrophes at hand for things like this one website to make me feel a whole lot.

On the plus side, though, knowing about them gives me one more group of idiots to reference whenever I go on rants about the types of people that don't do this world any favors. Like the Bush Administration and the environmental protections they're trying to undo (or have already succeeded at undoing) for their own sorts of gain. It's been my impression, though, that "people" issues like wars and abortion take popular priority over the ever-present issue of taking care of the planet that we live on and ought to be responsibly sharing with other species, even though the latter will mean a lot more in the longterm. Obviously, though, environmental issues in and of themselves have no relevance in this thread.

I might come off as a cold individual on a lot of things, but it all boils down to point of view and what matters most to an individual. Human life and respecting it is important to me, but I tend to reserve my consideration and respect for lives that have been established in the world, not for "what-could-be-but-as-yet-aren't" humans-in-progress lurking inside reproductive females the world over. Other animals don't seem to have the same obsession with embryos that humans do -- female European rabbits, for instance, commonly reabsorb unborn litters if living conditions don't meet a certain standard. Rather interesting, that their environment helps dictate when future generations are to be prevented, even if they're "already on the way."

I've never had to deal with the issue of abortion in my own life or with anyone I've known, so in a sense I'm detached from it. I don't have a decisive opinion on the matter and I am perfectly fine with people making a decision about it that works for them -- if they make a bad choice, they're the ones who are going to have to live with it. And if for whatever reason I somehow end up having to decide between abortion or carrying a child to term in my own life, I'll make the decision that works for me.

As has been said, though, there is a gigantic surplus of human beings in the world and, quite honestly, the more births that are prevented now the better chances we'll have of getting our population down to a reasonable size. For me, the issues of curbing our growth, reducing our own malignant effect on Earth, and ensuring that our activities do not disrupt the survival of other species is considerably more important and of larger scope than technicalities like whether or not tiny organisms scarcely resembling human beings and completely dependent on the body of their mother have souls or rights.

Just my two cents, just because no viewpoints like this have come up in this thread yet and, hey, we need a little diversity everywhere. Of course two cents aren't worth anything these days, so the phrase "just my two cents" becomes increasingly appropriate as individual opinions become less and less significant.

Good luck rallying support, Salzman.

--Reichu (RKC)
http://www.avians.net/rkc/

Stating one's views on abortion always entails the risk of causing people who previously had no beefs with you to suddenly turn around and condemn you, but I suppose that's their own loss if they want to let their own extreme convictions separate themselves from other people like that. Anyways...

The bit on European rabbits is only there because I recently finished reading Watership Down. Great book if you're like me and enjoy a straightforward, but intelligent and meaningful, read. Watching the movie a while back with Mare-chan -- after having seen it once when I was younger and only the violent scenes lingering in my recollection -- gave me a pleasant surprise, as it turned out being what I can only call "cool" (in the most honest and flattering way). The book remained on my "to-read" list until I took English Comp II, where writing an original literary criticism was one of the assignments and gave me an impetus to get through the book. (I can be terribly bad at getting through books on my own, no matter how great the book I'm reading might be.) From what I remember of the movie, it was actually very faithful to the book -- it changed a couple of things and did the requisite truncating, but those are minor quibbles, I think. I'm looking forward to getting ahold of the DVD, at any rate.

Stupidly enough, it's 6 AM the morning after my last Comp II meeting and that dratted paper still isn't done. ::dies:: And, listening outside, I can hear major sirens going off. Makes me wonder what sort of calamity is occuring in the neighborhood, but odds are I'll never find out.

NOW PLAYING: "Ryuu no shounen" ("Dragon Boy", for those of you who don't understand the title at a glance; when you translate Japanese tracklists for fun like I do, "ryuu" and "shounen" become pretty basic terminology) from "Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi" (or "Spirited Away" if you don't feel like writing that out). Good stuff from the fellow who calls himself Joe Hisaishi (not his real name, you know), written for a groovy movie (I think I like Mononoke better, but still). Listen to the track "Futatabi" sometime -- I had it stuck in my head the other day, it's so purty. Naturally, this soundtrack is on my rather extensive "to-get" list. Yeah, I know, "it's available domestically, so there's no excuse". But I have folks to pay off.

Those Evas, How Gay Can They Get?

[If you've read the Banter before this one... very gay, indeed. But that's beside the point. ::p]

[May 11, 2003] End of semester, virtually 2:00 at night. I have better things to do than add an entry to Banter, don't I? Of course I do. But earlier tonight (technically yesterday, but nevermind) I was AIMed while searching for photographic reference material in Google. Wowsers, someone who had seen my webpage and was interested in knowing more about "Holy Shito!"? How often does that happen? I'm a sucker when it comes to being given a chance to do some storytelling, so I chatted with this person for a while. It was a rather interesting dialogue and I'm glad I saved it. In fact, it's so intriguing that I'm going to share it with you. It's perhaps against my better judgment, but something makes me want to share this. Maybe it's the "shocker ending".

I took out the AIM handles, of course. I'll probably edit the dialogue more later, too. (I reveal too much about HS!, likely.)

This sort of thing tends not to happen to me when I chat online. Actually, there's only one person I know who would end a dialogue in the rather... eloquent ::cough-cough:: manner that the fellow above did. In fact, I had a link on TRS to this "one person" at one point, but I finally realized how prudent it would be to remove it.

Anyways, this guy... I'll call him Nuwan here (his real name, but he never uses it online, so it doesn't matter). Sometime last Fall(-ish), he found me during my short stay at Animeboards [really, it gets annoying arguing over the same things again and again with those people, hence the "short stay"] and we had some interesting conversations over ICQ and, later, AIM. Some anime debates, some philosophical discussions. Nothing objectionable at first, nothing to make me dislike him. It turned out this fellow was about my age and lived about a half hour from where I do. Everyone says I need to get out more and make more friends, so, eh, I figured why not? I went ahead and met up with the guy at a public mall.

It seemed to go well enough. After that, we talked on the phone a few times, and I had him over to my place for a couple of hours. Sometimes, though, once you get to know someone to a certain point, you realize you've reached the end of the line. Nuwan was not necessarily a bad person, but he had issues. He had a boatload of problems very different from my own, and, from my point of view, these, along with some of his personality quirks, made us incompatible. I can't go into it here, but, basically, he wasn't the sort of person I wanted to hang out with. With that realization, I needed to cut whatever sort of "friendship" Nuwan and I had off.

For whatever reason, he seemed to insist on me telling him precisely what my beefs with him were, and, after it was all over, Nuwan turned rotten. I suppose he had been a bad egg, of sorts, all along, but he had managed to manifest some degree of maturity and intelligence in our previous dealings. No more. After we stopped talking, he started to regard me with the caustic, immature scorn that he seemed to hold for so much else of the world, and he gave me a rather unfriendly flaming on his webpage. (I'll only provide the link to those who ask. Going out on a limb and assuming I have any "fans" who read this stuff, linking to Nuwan's flames has the slightest potential of being a messy business.) That was January, and I didn't hear a peep from him after that.

But, well, my fellow Evangelion worshipper Morgan-kun told me about some happenings at Animeboards and I made one of my random little posts. I know Nuwan still reads around on AB, so I venture to guess that he saw my post and was reminded about the girl he loves to hate. (So it would seem, anyway. Back when we were talking, he had the nerve to ask me for a picture of myself in a thong. He never got such a picture, and he'd likely deny the fact that he ever said such a thing if you were to put him up to it now. Nevermind any of the things I might've said to him -- I might've reciprocated by asking for a picture of him in garters, I'm not sure. >::p) So, I further speculate that he went ahead and made an AIM nickname I wasn't aware of and, soon as he saw me online, pretended to be someone I'd never talked to who was genuinely interested in (if a bit suspiciously clueless about) a certain little doujinshi I've been working on. Of course, sooner or later he had enough of his little game, and quickly delivered his trademark brand of flaming and raised my warning level from 0 to 35, signing off and leaving me to wonder what the he11 had just happened.

There's little doubt in my mind that my old friend Nuwan was behind it. Taking advantage of my respectable online nature (i.e., giving anyone a chance as long as they're respectable and I can actually understand most of what they write) and playing me for a fool -- I can't say I appreciate such blatant demonstrations of petty immaturity and spite. Makes me wonder what Nuwan really thinks about "Holy Shito!", as well. When we were on amicable terms, he actually did seem to be a bit interested in it. But none of that means much when you're someone, like Nuwan, who looks for people to flame when you're bored (I'm pretty sure he does stuff like that). And not that it would matter what, indeed, Nuwan thinks. He's given me enough reasons to basically discredit anything he says.

As for "HS!"... It's a doujinshi. People in Japan make them all the time and the animators don't care. It's a normal occurence over there. Of course, I'm not in Japan, but I'm a fan of the anime (NGE) nonetheless, and it's nothing unusual for devoted fans to make up related stories or create related artwork or whatever. And I'm not even saying I'm ever going to try to publish this thing (assuming I ever finish it, and only after getting permission, of course) like doujinshi are. It's just a creative outlet for me right now, heavily personal. Will most people find it strange? I'd be surprised if they didn't. Needless to say, there is nothing wrong with "strange" [unless the definition of "strange" being used refers to activities such as luring young children into your house, doing explicit and unspeakable things to them, and finally sending them through a meat grinder and having their remnants with your lunch -- you get the idea]. Basically, Nuwan, dear, if you don't like the idea of Naoko having a baby or Yui getting down with Zer, the solution is simple -- forget about it and get on with your life. Oy.

At any rate, this whole incident will have the unfortunate effect of making me a wee bit apprehensive next time an unfamiliar name appears and pops me a question about Yui and friends.

Now playing: "Winding to Infinity" by Michael Whalen, from the "Forever Wild" soundtrack. It's the OST for a nature documentary of some sort and I simply must acquire it someday. I've only heard some of the songs, but a number of artists feature who I'm rather fond of. And this song, well -- it's short, but it's beautiful, and gives me another reason besides "Phantom of the Forest" (great CD) to love Michael Whalen. (Not the fantasy/sci-fi artist, mind you.)

Art and Evangelions

[April 13, 2003] What a bizarre day it's been... What a bizarre weekend, actually. One of the first times in recently memory I've devoted so many of my waking hours to ... art. Not that the updates lately have been any indication, but I'm supposed to be an artist and all. I've been wanting to get more in touch with that artist in me for some time, too, and I guess part of that is managing to simply lose oneself in the work. And I managed to do that today, as virtually all I can remember doing is drawing. When I finally got off the couch a little while ago, my bum was numb. I'd been there a bit too long.

I've been working hard in my Painting I class. Well, a lot of other students don't seem to mind starting and finishing their paintings during the first couple of hours in class and then leaving, but, I dunno... If I'm going to work on something that's going to be any more than a doodle (i.e., a painting), I have to decide on what I'm going to do, see it in my mind, and have a visual to base the painting on already prepared. That's just how I work. I like concise organic forms and I'm not likely to stray from that preference when left to my own devices. Since in Painting I we're just doing exercises in technique (and since they're just "exercises" it's questionable why I feel like I have to put so much thought into each painting...), the subject matter is left to me. I agonize far too much about "what" I'm going to do; definitely one of my shortcomings, and I'd probably get much more done if I just went with the first idea that came to mind. But, no, I muse over one idea until I get another, then another, and soon enough things just get messy and overcomplicated.

I'm about three paintings behind schedule right now, which is a definite problem, especially considering the threatening imminence of getting seriously to work on two English-related things (::shiver::). The one I've been working on for the "blending" assignment has been most troublesome. Heck, I could've put a bunch of shaded globules on a canvasboard and turned that in, but, no, I have to be far more ambitious... This painting started off intended for another assignment, in which we had to choose between doing a wash with acrylic or oils (you know, diluting the paint enough so that it became transparent and would be layered like watercolour) or doing an underpainting of sorts that would essentially be a simplified version of the finished painting. I was going to tackle the latter, but I'd left my preparatory materials at home (shanty as they had been). So, in my frustration, I came up with a drawing of Azazel (my demonic red kerub character) and thought would serve as the basis for a painting. I transferred the outline to canvasboard and started shading her in monochrome dark green -- was supposed to be an underpainting, albeit not the type professor had in mind, so I ended up switching my intent to doing the painting in wash.

Well, that didn't work out very well, for various reasons... The original green I'd layed on for Azaz looked pretty sharp (and earned the comment from one of my peers, "Cool! Ass tails!"), but the wash idea worked less well the more I layered on. What I wanted the painting to be wasn't harmonious with "wash", so, in frustration, I started painting it over in acrylic. A bit later on, I still don't have a painting for that wash-or-underpainting assignment, but the blending assignment finally comes up, and, well, I have this unfinished Azazel painting. Why not? I usually work in acrylic, and I'd started to paint over the wash part of Azazel with acrylic, but "blending" seemed to lend itself to the whole idea of what oils were supposed to be good for, so I pulled those out of the drawer, determined to finish the goddam painting with those.

It wasn't long after I had contaminated Azazel with oils that I remembered where my preference for acrylics had come from. Oils smell! (Doesn't help that I'm extremely sensitive to certain types of odors, either.) They get all over everything! You need volatile chemicals to clean your brushes! And they take too bloody long to dry!! Terrible, terrible. That painting's been a struggle ever since. I recently decided that the totally unplanned first stab at a background sux0red, so, yesterday (Saturday), I spent a good deal of the day brushing in a new background (since the old one was finally dry). It's just this swirly purple stuff, but the task was rendered harder than it needed to be because, well, Azazel was in the way. I spent a lot of time cutting out pieces of masking tape (as I had nothing more practical handy) to cover her with. So, currently, that's drying. The painting's still a ways from done, though. The messes I get myself into... Common sense would say, "Just start a new painting and do something simple and easy." When passion's in the way, though, I find myself not wanting to prescribe to "common sense".

Passion is weird. At twenty, I'm still a stranger to the usual sense of the word -- that is, romantic/erotic passion for another person. (I've had a couple of crushes, but those hardly count.) Not too different from most humans in being heavily preoccupied with romantic/erotic thought, however. I've been wanting to do a painting with an erotic sort of theme for some time -- not pornography persay, but an image decidedly intimate, sensual. A while back I was in a Borders with my friend Mare-chan, looking for a suitable book on human anatomy (being as I lacked any such resource at the time and, well, it's hard to draw naked Evangelions without one), and I stumbled on this book, "Love / Lust / Desire", full of "erotic photography for couples". Nothing in it really fell under "pornographic" -- some of it was bizarre, certainly, but it was, above all else, artistic. That and the slight mar on the cover which entitled me to a 10% discount (ever the opportunist am I ;;}) seemed reason enough for me to pick it up. I've looked at it quite a bit since then (and, no, not for particularly questionable reasons ::P); no doubt it's been feeding my desire to create the aforementioned type of painting.

Namely, I've been wanting to do another painting of Naoko and Barb, being as the one I did for Color Theory class ("Carrying You ~Fortitude~"), while still a decent painting, is more than a little obsolete as far as my depictions of nude Evas go, and it doesn't depict the couple in a moment of closeness, anyway. Just in case you're confused... "Naoko and Barb", to any "normal" person, refer to EVA-00 and EVA-03 from the anime "Neon Genesis Evangelion", and if you're reading this stuff (i.e., any of the blather on my webpage) you ought to know well by now my... unique fascination with depicting Evangelions unarmored, i.e., completely in the buff (which is something perhaps no more than a very small handful of the thousands of "NGE" fans are wont to do). And, for the last couple of years, I've been working on a doujinshi under the working title "Holy Shito!" that is essentially just an excuse to develop that anime's Evangelions and "angels" into full-fledged characters.

There's really nothing in the anime to suggest that EVA-00 and EVA-03, if left to their own devices, would enter a long-term relationship (that is, unless you have a rather active imagination and can't ignore the suggestiveness of one particular scene in episode 18 ^_^). And there's nothing really that directly suggests that Akagi Naoko (who I've long accepted, despite shortcomings of evidence in the anime, is the soul of Zerogouki) could possess inclinations to lesbianism. (Also nothing canon in terms of who the soul of EVA-03 is, because it has absolutely no relevance in the anime, so she's Barbara Caraway to me.) However, it's my doujinshi, and, in it, Naoko and Barb fall in love.

Now, they're a pair of characters that makes "Holy Shito!" worth doing, simply because they're just something else. It's not really possible for anyone reading this to know much about Barb's character until I finish the blasted thing (unless you're someone I've been sharing preliminary "HS!" materials with, which might apply to, hmm... one person? heh) -- well, right now there's a blurb about her on my "HS!" page (but that's not quite the same as knowing about the sorts of things that come out of her mouth)... Take Naoko, anyway -- she's not originally my character, and, while I've developed her quite a bit, I base as much of her as possible off her rather short appearance in the anime (well, along with what we see of her as an Eva). It's really quite, um, different to think about her being romantically involved with another Evangelion -- especially if you consider the kind of person she was before she committed suicide (as a Lilim) and the circumstances of her original Evangelion lifespan. She only comes to love Barb because of a substantial amount of personal growth on her part, and a lot of that comes from accepting many things: That she's done a lot of terrible things; that she has many regrets; that she's experienced death twice; that she's in a very different body now; that she's not quite as heterosexual as she believed herself to be.

One of the things I love about the Evangelions to begin with is that they are female and humanoid (accepting the female part takes some degree of faith, which I provide gleefully) without following our own standards of "femininity". This aspect also makes the concept of an Evangelion couple more interesting -- they're lesbians, with a twist. Their physical attraction to one another also ends up being founded on something deeper than standard ideas of human attraction (they're both humans, after all, just in somewhat different bodies). Personally, I find it all rather... cute, and, above all, intriguing. It's love taking on forms unfamiliar to us, and that's really my main reason for wanting to depict it... Because it's so different and it sort of forces a polarized reaction: Either you're repelled (and you tell me it's "interesting" out of courtesy) or you're intrigued (and you say it's "interesting" and you really mean it). Or, well, you're used enough to my weirdness that you'll just nod your head and say, "That's nice, Rachel...".

So much do I want to paint any image of Barb/Naoko closeness that I spent the entire day developing one possible idea for one. I actually began with the ambition of thinking that I would just collect a few "interesting objects" and make a still-life for myself to paint (as I was supposed to have done a black-and-white painting for tomorrow -- er, today? -- that we would spend class-time glazing into color), but, well, soon as I saw my Kaiyodo EVA-00 and EVA-03 together on the shelf, I sort of canned that idea. Disconcertingly, Barb's right arm was missing (and still no where in sight), but I didn't let that stop me. With a cardboard box and three garments, I fashioned a makeshift "bed" for the lovers and positioned them (with some difficulty) side-by-side, arms intertwined and looking each other longingly in the eyes (or eye, as it were), upon it. I then spent hours unknown attempting to draw the spectacle -- transforming the crude action figures, naturally, into fleshy beings. Much easier said that done; even after all that time spent drawing and looking up details in an anatomy book, some elements look positively dodgy, and Barb's feet still aren't filled in. They're at weird perspectives, so I'll probably just have to use my own feet as references (hello, mirror!). I was watching crappy old tapes of "Animaniacs" the whole time, too -- wonder if that was a mistake or not...

Well, here's hoping that drawing actually turns into a painting that executes itself relatively smoothly (unlike Azazel ::cough::). I would've been better off drawing my feet and otherwise finishing that drawing up than sitting here typing this shiznat, but, eh, what can ya do... Time to wrap this up, and maybe even upload it immediately, for once... I have to get out earlier than usual tomorrow, as I scheduled an appointment for that imbecilic-but-loveable bird, Donald -- he needs a checkup, and the idiot's been pulling his feathers out with unusual vim lately. Argh.

Now Playing: "Moon Run" by Trapezoid. Gotta love those Narada Collection thingies.

[March 21, 2003, circa 2 AM]

This month is going absolutely down the drain. I'm too young to be letting time just slip past me like this, aren't I? Next thing I know I'll be middle-aged, still single, and at least 40 pounds fatter (though I personally hope the latter two will not be true by the time I'm middle-aged...). But, wait a second... Isn't time just an artifact of our neural processes? It's not something material, that can be managed, have any real value placed upon it! Yet in this ludicrous world we've made for ourselves, time management is a real life skill, and who hasn't heard the equation "time is money"? What a load of nonsense. Whatever happened to the good old days of human existence before "time" could be accurately measured and people could do so many more things on nature's clock or otherwise take their bloody good time, instead of feeling the constant looming, stress-inducing threat of scheduled life? ::sigh:: But what am I complaining about? Approaching 21 years and I've managed to avoid such realities as employment and taxes. Some "adult" I am.

It'll all catch up to me one of these days, though. Meantime, I'm still living with the folks, plodding through two years' worth of community college while my peers zoom towards independence and their rightful place in corporate America. At least, I can only assume that's what some of them are up to. I know assuming stuff is no good, but, eh... My head, medicated as it is, continues to dwell "in the clouds" -- or, might we say, preoccupy itself with a world of "fantasy". But, last I checked, this was a relatively common human phenomenon, so I don't know why I make it sound like something I ought to not be doing. I tend to do that with a lot of things, now and again. I have a bad habit of thinking about certain things too much -- like trying to guess what sort of thought my own behaviors instills in others. Quite odd, being as, when you get down to the nitty-gritty, I am immune to the phenomenon of peer pressure (I had to watch all of those poor souls succumb to it in public school, and all the meantime wondering what's so bloody hard about doing your own thing) and, as I've mentioned elsewhere, continue to think and do what I want regardless of what "they" think or do. I'm just full of them quirks.

Hmm, well, an hour for two paragraphs -- typically slow writing for me. (I can actually type relatively fast -- though I don't have any "words per minute" stats for myself handy -- but, most of the time when I'm writing something on the computer, I take my bloody sweet time. What am I doing? Thoroughly contemplating everything as I write it? Either that or over-multitasking like any other good ADD individual.) Like always, I know I had more stuff I was going to write, but it seems to have been spun-cycled in by brain into non-existence while I got up to get a bagel. ::shrug:: Oh well. Nothing wrong with short banter, I suppose -- though being short it's much easier to tell that a particular entry (like this one) lacks any real point or meaning. Few things in life have a real point, though. Like, er, an... appendix. Yeah. I knew my life was just a vestigial excuse for something else! I knew it!

Hmm, I just completely lost myself on that one! I'd say it's a good time to call it a night, wouldn't you? But before I end this for good, let's see what's on Winamp... Hmm, the one-track album known as "Secret of Mana +". Weird, weird, and more weird. It's hard as frell to pick out Kikuta's original Seiken Densetsu (2 & 3) tunes from this 49-minute hodgepodge (except for a few really obvious ones). Assuming all of the segments you can break the 49 minutes into (I came up with fourteen, myself) contain actual material from those two games, I've figured out maybe a quarter of them. Pathetic, I know. (It's Kikuta's fault for not using more of my personal faves.) Even more pathetic is that I actually bought this album when I could've used my money on something I would listen to a lot more often, but, what can I say -- I downloaded the segment containing "Ancient Dolphin" and I dug it.

[March 7, 2003]

Another "update", another Banter. What more can be expected from me these days? In truth, I have every intention of adding tons of artwork -- old and new -- to the Gallery soon enough, but this is going to be a big project requiring much toil. The whole bloody site may well get a makeover, as there are various things about it that have been getting on my nerves. Namely, the background -- sure, all those stars look pretty and befit a page called "The ____ Sector" (at least if you've watched some "Star Trek" and associate the word "sector" with outer space), but they make the text a beeyotch to read. Plain black would be better, but I'm thinking I may just end up going with something lighter and blue-ish, like my "Reichu no VGM" page. It's simply more practical, and who ever said a "sector" had to be in outer space anyway? But a change as simple as altering the background will require reworking every single page's text colors and auxillary graphics (many of which are long due for replacements anyway) -- a taunting task, to say the least.

Regardless, a makeover is long due. This page needs a new format, a new look that reflects my current tastes. I need to filter through all of the content and banish some of the stuff to CD-R backup (so you'd better grab stuff while it's still here) to make room for the polished and new, text and imagery alike. I may just have to, contrary to everything my gut's been telling me, use frames after all, though I'll be contemplating long and hard about exactly what sort of setup would work. And maybe I'll even get a working guestbook one of these days. But I don't think I have the heart to change the page's title, so, whatever new look I end up going for, I'll still work the avian motif into things. I don't draw them nearly enough, but, heck, I still love birds. They kick arse. Except for the little round ones that bounce and tweet and all look the same (i.e., "virtually all passerines, with the distinguised exception of corvids") -- not that I despise them or anything, but they're not the sort of critters I'd want to run giant feeding stations for in winter and squint at with binoculars, like my mum does. Anyways...

This page has also been off AOL and on Avians for quite some time. Being on a private server with no ads that I don't have to pay a nickel for kicks a whole lot of passerine arse, when I stop to think about it. And, even with the message on the main page, I think I've been taking it a bit too much for granted. I hardly even talk to Matt (Lord Skandranon) or pop into his IRC, and I've been wasting loads of his bandwidth running a little VGM page that's far more popular than my personal one and doesn't really seem to belong on this sort of server -- pretty insolent, aren't I? I've been thinking of something I can do to make it up to him, show my gratitude, all that. I'm taking a painting class right now, so I can possibly show my gratitude and work on my college credits at the same time. I'll have to e-mail him and see if he savors the idea...

I had a lot more ideas for this entry driving home, a couple of hours ago around 11 AM, from an excursion to get a car mirror replaced and check out an art store at the "International Trade Center". I tend to rehearse lots of banter in my head when I'm engaged in the monotonous task of driving (bloody driving, bloody cars, bloody GWB!! GWARR!) and then never get around to writing it all down. My brain's a rather vast abyss, though, so a lot of stuff presumed to have been lost in it resurfaces every now and then (like when I'm just sitting around, minding my own business, when all of a sudden I remember vague imagery from a bizarre dream I had months ago, or something). At any rate, might as well keep this entry short, being as I need to feed myself, waste precious hours of my life playing "Breath of Fire 3", and maybe even use time wisely and work on some of the stuff I need to do for school. And just maybe I'll come back later and babble about my uneventful life, or the myriads of angels swarming in my head, or how absolutely hideous those recent Kaiyodo EVA-01 and Sachiel 'action figures' are (least, to my aesthetic sensibilities). Lata'!

Older Banter #3

Older Banter #2

Older Banter #1

rachel.k.clark@comcast.net

 The Raptorian Sector -- Banter. All original content © 1996-2003 Rachel K. Clark -- All Rights Reserved.
CREDITS FOR OTHER PICTURES:
Screenshots from "Evangelion" Copyright © GAINAX/Project Eva.
Screenshot from "Watership Down" Copyright © Nepenthe Productions.
"Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi" Copyright © Studio Ghibli.
"Metroid Prime" Copyright © Nintendo / Retro Studios.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.