Random Ramblings CCCXIII · 9:14am Sep 7th, 2018
IN WHICH I O.D. ON JAPAN
I've been on a serious Perfume kick lately, as you might know. Here's their most popular music video. Enjoy.
I'm gonna save songs I like more for later. On to my update. Please follow me.
Last night and earlier today, I took some time to rewrite the first chapter of my 30k word monster. Turns out I hadn't completed the flashback within the flashback -- replacing "tell" with "show" -- so I'm almost finished with that. I don't want it to get too wordy, as later chapters ought to be longer.
The final chapter before the epilogue is over 6,000 words by itself and that's after I split a timeskip off into its own (way shorter) chapter, giving the story eight chapters instead of the original seven. I originally planned this story to have only three chapters, but as I wrote, I realized more divisions needed to happen.
There's so much I want to say about this story, but I can't because I don't want to spoil anything. Not that it really matters. Sunset Shimmer doesn't appear in any capacity, so most likely only two people will read it.
As I've said before, yes I'm a little bitter that most of my followers only care when I write Sunset. That's not why I had her cameo in NQST, though. Her appearance there was important for Applejack's character. Again, trying to show instead of tell. Plus Sunset bantering with Flash is always fun to write.
Tonight I saw the limited release of Satoshi Kon's Perfect Blue in my local cinema. As one would expect from Kon-sensei, the movie (his first; he started as a painter and manga artist) is batshit crazy and also an absolute masterpiece. Regrettably, there is no mention of any possible Blu-ray release in the near future. But if GKids -- a sublabel of Universal -- manages to pull it out of licensing hell as they did with Only Yesterday, you better believe I'll buy it.
After leaving the cinema, I stopped by the Vintage Stock nearby to see if they had a copy of Kon's film Paprika on Bluray. They did not, so I bought Song of the Sea instead. I guess I'll have to get Paprika online. Sony has long had the rights to that one so hopefully it won't be too difficult to obtain. I then stopped at Walmart to buy cat food and figured I'd see what anime they had. Several Studio Ghibli films on Blu, but not the ones I actually wanted at the moment, so I bought their only Bluray copy of the MLP Movie. I'll watch it at some point.
Oh, and I ran into a couple of old college friends at the Perfect Blue showing, which was nice. It made me feel less alone.
If I could write a story even a third as batshit as what Kon-sensei did, I would die a happy man. Unlike Kon-sensei, who died eight years ago from pancreatic cancer while working on his final film (that ended up never being completed) -- he had regrets, mostly about leaving his work unfinished and his team behind; his final message was an apology that ended with "and now I have to go."
Fuck pancreatic cancer.
I'm upset at myself because despite going to the gym for the past month and not changing my diet in any major way, I still put on weight. I do officially enter my mid-30's in a couple of days so it could just be my metabolism giving up on me (not like I was skinny to begin with). I lost a lot of weight after graduating college due to less stress and giving up sugar drinks. It could be my nonexistent sleep schedule coupled with my medication and cyclical bouts of depression. Whenever I'm not eating or at the gym, I'm in bed, and I've been sleeping a lot the past week, mostly because I haven't had anything better to do. I often pass out after a meal (when I also take my pillz), so that could be part of it.
Yet I feel a little stronger. Slowly I'm upping the weights on some of the gym machines I use and going longer on the walkamajigs.
Wednesday night I overdid it at the gym and had to stop my workout before I did any of the muscle machines. I was dizzy and felt like I was going to die. I seriously considered once I got home sending one of my loyal followers links to my finished but unpublished works and notes for my unfinished stuff with a request to complete my silly little vision so as to not leave my two readers hanging.
I want to be a professional writer. But I know deep down I'll never be able to hack it. Against the advice of many prominent authors, I use fanfiction as a way to hone my technical skills, but it's simply not good enough. Readers seem to enjoy my characterizations, but I still suck at description. I want my readers to look into the world I commit to pixels and believe it.
I want you to feel the creepiness of Sunny Town -- its ancient crumbling houses, unusual smell, perpetual twilight, the gloom. The desolation and oppressive atmosphere of the ruined stone & marble city of Everfree (see MLP Episodes 2 & 67). If I'm not making you feel, then I'm not doing my job.
Anywho, it's 4:15am and I'm tired.
Peace out!
Could be fun to use the blogs as well to pick a place (in story or out) and give it a brief description. Say 150 words or less? Get you some more practice like that plus it won't be entirely sunset-dependent