☆❀☆

Someone wants to roleplay VH stuff with me, and I'm simultaneously delighted and terrified. (That always happens when I start playing a new character, though. It's scary! But could be really fun! We shall see.)

Planned to do a ton of editing on the wiki this weekend, but that... did not happen. Maybe it'll happen tomorrow. Probably not.

HOWEVER I did get the draft for the Den/Ice fest finished. That sucker is FINISHED. ... But now I need to type it all up and revise it and pick at it and just, ugh. But hopefully I'll be finished with this soon. Like, tomorrow.

DEADLINES щ(◉Д◉щ)

In other news, my friends keep nudging me to watch Over the Garden Wall. Yesterday, I found out that the episodes are hella short. Like, short short.

And this means: I am totally going to watch it. Absolutely. Short episodes are where it's at, at least for me. :D Length aside though, it totally looks relevant to my interests; the style reminds me of Moomins.

What I should do is talk all about my vacation. I'll probably do that eventually but honestly, even though I got back yesterday, I'm really exhausted. That can wait.

Since getting back I've been reminded of a lot of the reasons I needed a vacation in the first place. Living with family is just such a bloody pain in the ass. ... Anyway.

Didn't get as much writing finished while I was away that I had hoped to. The plan was to 1. finish something, 2. make headway on something in progress, and 3. start something else. Well, I finished two drafts, but not two fics, and the drafts are for stories that are so old and so bad that I probably won't be doing anything with them except for posting them in my writing journal and not mentioning them ever again. And I did make headway on the long Norway/Germany fic I'm writing, but not as much as I like. Though I at least completed the scene that I was having trouble with, which is something. Didn't start anything new, though I wanted to, because somehow I just ended up not having the time for it.

I've been roleplaying a ton lately - both before I left for vacation, and a little bit after that. The APH anon meme was having its yearly Battle Royale event so there was no way I was going to miss playing in that... even if I had to stay up until ridiculous hours of the morning to complete some of those threads. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to be involved in the same way that I was last year due to time constraints (partly brought on by vacation. I wasn't willing to sacrifice my daytimes in order to get threads done). So what happened was less violence and more angst, alas. Maybe things will be more interesting next year. On the upside, the event sparked a private thread with Monaco, which we'll be using to take our interaction during the BR in a direction that we weren't able to take it during the actual event. And Norway screwed up his friendship with Spain, so following up on that when we both have time will be interesting.

:Va I'm making this all sound like a soap opera, which isn't really the intention, though considering how angst-filled this BR was I suppose it isn't so far off....

... jfc it's 9 PM and I am exhausted, what the hell. I don't understand. Anyway. Unrelated to anything else, I really should start reading more nonfiction. I've been intending to, and in fact I have piles and piles of books on various subjects that I mean to get around to reading, but I never do. I think maybe I'm just usually too blah to even want to engage my brain lately, so I end up reaching for trashy crime novels instead. Not such a bad thing really, but I shouldn't be reading that stuff all the time.

Mind you, I've been having trouble reading fiction, too. Or at least, certain kinds. I started to read Les Miserables and my eyes kind of glazed over after a little while... then again I get the impression that's kind of a common reaction. And it doesn't help that I was trying to read it on the computer. I'd probably do better with a paper copy. (But I don't want to buy it/lug around a big brick of a novel, which is why I was reading the Project Gutenberg version in the first place. Sigh)

So, the Hetalia kink meme is moving. This should be interesting. I'm going to have to set up new indexes for everything. Fun. Oh well, that's fine with me. I'll just start from the top and work my way back, like I did before, and even if it takes me a while, that doesn't matter. I've thought about getting help for it, but I don't know who I could ask, and it'd probably be easier to keep track of everything if I did it myself.

I managed to finish the draft of that fest fic I've been working on while I was out having lunch today; I had the foresight to bring some paper with me to scribble on. Now it's just a matter of getting it typed up and finished. It won't be as good as I wanted it to be, and I won't be able to do a second story for this thing, but at least I will manage to submit something. ... And after I do that, I'll be able to work on something else! Not to mention reading the stuff that has already gone up.

I think my roleplay mojo has come back. I was kind of in a slump there, but now things have turned around. I start and then look up and somehow it's three hours later, haa. In fact, I've even started playing Poland again. Just a little bit, though! And I don't really intend to bring him to the anonmeme, either, just doing some DR threads. He's kind of exhausting to play because he's so different from Norway and getting his voice down is a lot harder for me. Super fun, though.

I'm not sure how many people on my flist are familiar with Ursula Vernon and her award-winning comic Digger, but there's an omnibus edition of it being put out soon. They decided to do a kickstarter for it... right now they're fully-funded, so at this point the project is definitely going through; it's just that right now where'll be neat extras. 8) For a while I was waffling on it, buying each volume separately really would be better since it'd be easier for reading than a big fat book like that will be, but... I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to get a signed hardcover.

Originally I started reading Digger when it was first published on the internet - it was at some comic site, I dunno' - and I loved it but I quickly fell behind, and while the latest page was free you had to pay to read previous, so I never did catch up. Since Ursula's been one of my favourite artists for years and years now, it'll be nice to have the comic in a format that I can actually see and read. Aside from that, I only have a few prints of her actual art. Come to think of it, it's just the Taxman stuff, I think. I really should fix that one of these days. Not to mention that I'm really bummed that I was never able to buy any of her originals back when they were more frequently available. Ah, well.

Fffbt. Anyway. Aside from that, nothing much is going on. The copy I ordered of Siren's Hobbit-inspired fashion artbook was sent two weeks ago but it's still not here and I feel antsy even though I know it's likely just Canada Post being slow as molasses again.

So, after doing some looking around, I'll probably have a job after Easter. Most excellent. It isn't in the bag yet - I still need to apply formally - but it's at a business owned by a friend of the family, so I'll be very surprised if I don't get it. Times like this, I'm quite glad for my father's connections. 8) I'll be making less money than I am now, but it's still very reasonable - and at normal working hours, too! I'll finally get to have a life again! :D

The end of the fest is coming up, and I'm super excited to read everyone's stuff. I'm already taking notes and planning out what to do differently for the next one. (Namely, longer writing period + shorter posting period. Just for one.) Still not sure when the next might be. Spanning July and August, maybe. I dunno', I'll have to think about it. Anyway, even though a lot of people still haven't put in their stuff yet, I'm pleased with it - considering it was all thrown together on such short notice, at least.

I signed up for the anonmeme's Battle Royale roleplay event, aw yiss. Can't wait for an opportunity to have Norway kicking ass and taking names (if I don't suddenly discover that real life is going to leave me with no time and so will end up having to kill him off early on... it's about 50/50 whether that'll happen, heh). Really wish I could find where on earth I put the novel version of Battle Royale, though. I bought it shortly before I moved from Saskatchewan and haven't seen it since. I'm sure it's packed away somewhere in the zillions of boxes I have in the basement, but where is it? I never even got to read the damn thing. :| Fffffffu.

Ugh, lately, I've been itching to go SOMEWHERE. It doesn't help that I keep hearing coworkers go "Oh yeah, I just booked a trip to Mexico on a whim, yay! :D". Yeah, it's nice that you can just pick up and go whenever the hell you want. ... What makes it worse is the reason that I can't go anywhere isn't that I don't have the cash. I do have the money. But my family is clingy as fuck, and there is no way that I'd be able to travel even in my own country on my own without them breathing down my neck about it - and never mind the idea of just picking up and going somewhere in Europe without a friend going along. No way.

I'm probably just frustrated and bored. I really need a day off, heh. Good thing I'll get one soon! Maybe I'll stop being batshit and stir-crazy after a couple of days to just unwind.

Man, I feel so tired lately. What's up with that?
(Okay, I know what's up with that. Way too many nights spent staying up until 2 AM roleplaying. But it was worth it for the France -> Nor interaction. Oh yes.)

Heading back to work on Monday. Even though I had a nice long holiday, I'm feeling kind've - hmm, bothered. I feel like I didn't manage to do any of the things I had wanted to do, largely because of family interference. It's really very annoying. And man, I'm not looking forward to not having any free time whatsoever again. Occupied 4:30AM-7PM for ten days on is rather... well, it's not ideal. But! The job is only until June. I can deal.

On the upside, I did manage to get some headway done on writing. Not enough, mind you. It's really difficult to find time to work on things, anything at all, due to things like family interfering, and that's really bothersome. Then work -- well, I don't know.

I'll be trying to wake up really early tomorrow in order to take care of the index updates. I put them up for far too long. And personal things -- writing - hopefully I'll manage to do some of that. Or something. I just feel so frustrated, because soon there will be absolutely no time. At the end of a workday, I'm so exhausted that I can barely keep my eyes open, so -- well. Anyway. Maybe it'll get easier over time.

I came across a stray Swedish coin yesterday when I was cleaning the bag I took with me to Europe, and seeing it made me feel - well, I can't really describe it. It was a weird feeling, and kind've sad in a way. Maybe I just miss being around friends, and maybe I miss being there too, and I have a few regrets (mainly related to being far too shy and awkward) but it's all so -- strange. I don't know.

Lately, whenever I try to write something in my journal, I end up wanting to backdate it so that people don't see it (well, don't see it on their flists, I mean) because it's just the same old stuff. And when I do post something different it seems so frivolous. It's a weird feeling and I don't like it, but maybe I'll give into it occasionally, because at least then I'll actually write out what I'm thinking. Yes, that sounds good.

Canucks, what the hell was that.

A 4-0 loss. Stanley Cup game. What.

THEY DIDN'T EVEN SCORE -- actually that's probably what annoys me the most.

Maybe I should've known better than to hope they'd do well, but man. I just. UGH.

Vancouver, I am disappoint.

---

Yes, nothing much going on in my life right now, so I figured I'd vent my half-assed rage about the hockey. JFC I don't even -- well, anyway.

This weekend past, I spent the entire two days in a classroom for Driver's Ed. That was incredibly dull, and it reminded me of a lot of things I certainly don't miss about being a student - like, you know how there's always one person who will just Never. Shut. Up. And won't let the teacher just teach. Man, I hate that. Anyway, that portion is done, though if I didn't pass the written exam I'll have to do it again (haven't heard back on that yet). My first actual driving lessons aren't until the 27th, though.

BUT. Aside from that. Nothing interesting. Except roleplaying, I suppose, but what I'm doing right now is just so very self-indulgent that I'm just like... actually I'm slightly self-conscious about it, come to think of it. (Playing out a pairing that doesn't make any sense, just because we can. Well, it's all in good fun, so eh. A little bit difficult to wrangle, though - it's a challenge to throw this pairing together without it seeming too forced! A welcome challenge, though.)

AND. I'm exhausted because I stayed up too late last night reading some cheap and ridiculous action-adventure novel. If I'm not careful I might develop a taste for those things, hah. Should be careful not to stay up until 2 AM more than I already am doing, no sir. Somebody needs to whack me over the head and tell me to stop making dumb decisions.

☆ I keep wanting to update, but then I suddenly find myself staring at the screen, unable to come up with a single thing. Let's see if pointnotes work better. It's just, I don't want to lose track of what's been going on in my life, you know? The days are already running together as it is, and occasionally being busy with real-life things certainly doesn't really help me keep stuff together.

☆ I see that some of you are still in the middle of exams and whatnot. Good luck with that! I'm sure y'all can get through it well enough. And for those who have already had their exams, congratulations on surviving that and coming out of it in one piece. ;p

☆ For ages, this place was still drab and dead and grey, but then suddenly a couple days ago all the trees started bursting with buds. Now we have leaves and green grass and it feels so, so good to see that, finally. The lilac bushes aren't in bloom yet, but when they do come around, our back patio is going to smell heavenly. I can hardly wait until mum starts planting the flowers.

☆ My province is experiencing a large spate of wildfires right now. Apparently the same amount has been burned already this spring as was burned in the entirety of last year...? Or so I've heard. Though it did rain today, for about a week it had been awfully dry and windy. And unfortunately, a town a good while south of here, Slave Lake, has been burned in one of the fires. Not sure when they're going to start letting people return to the undamaged parts of what remain of the Slave Lake area; things aren't quite under control yet. It's troubling. As for myself - a few people have mentioned being a bit worried - there's nothing to be concerned about. There is a fire up north of here, but there always is at this time of year. It isn't close enough to worry about. It has disrupted activity at some of the oil plant sites, and some work camps have been evacuated or so I hear, but this isn't anywhere near Fort McMurray itself. Don't worry. I'm fine. (I'm more concerned about the residents of Fort McKay. They're quite close to where this is going on, and could very well be in the path of it. And I think there's another fire up close to Fort Chipewyan, argh...)

☆ Eurovision was... interesting. Man, Moldova, what was that. And congratulations to Azerbaijan, I suppose, though it's not the song I would've picked to win (it's all right, but kind of bland). I mean, I realize the actual songs don't have a lot to do with the results, but still. Personally, I was hoping Bosnia-Hrzegovina would do well, as I loved that song - and I guess sixth place is pretty good, considering. But I kinda' wish Serbia scored higher; "Čaroban" is so good, ahhh that song is just -- it makes me so happy. And I really wish Bulgaria's song had made it past the semi-finals; I really liked that one.

☆ I'd intended to have a fic written for May 17th. Didn't manage it, obviously. I'm a little disappointed in myself for not being vigilant enough to get it done, but then again, considering how hard it is to write at home, I guess it can't be helped. The story is about 1/3rd written, and it isn't intrinsically tied to the date or anything, so I will finish it and post it somewhere when it's done - though whether I'll just do it as anonymous is still to be decided. I'll just revise the opening so the date is broad and open and not directly stated. But -- yeah. Disappointed. This is just ridiculous, and to be honest, part of the reason I can hardly wait to get a job - aside from needing employment - is that then, I will be able to write. I have no trouble writing at a busy lunch table in the staff room; it's just when my parents are breathing down my neck that I find it hard to concentrate.

☆ I've been roleplaying more than usual lately. It gets kind of crazy, trying to keep up with several threads at once, but I think I'm managing it okay. But the main thing of note - I feel kind of silly talking about it, but then again, it is my journal - is that after over a year of bouncing our characters off one another, my Norway finally got a kiss from that Denmark. I've wanted that for ages, and for it to finally happen just made me really, really happy. Again: it's silly to be so happy about it, maybe -- but then again, there's nothing wrong with being made happy by small, silly things, is there?

☆ And one more APH-related thing. The recent blog updates with the little drawings of sleeping nations are just so cute -- ahhh, I'm just going to put my favourite up here so I can stare at it whenever I feel like it.

( Under a cut, of course )

I am exhausted because I stayed up until a ridiculous hour roleplaying and such. Not that I'm complaining, exactly. It was totally worth it. (Man, that Denmark. What a guy.) But ugh, I did that for two nights this week. Not exactly wise. But I just couldn't resist, ahhhh. I hardly get the chance to play nowadays, with the exception of the slow-thread I've been doing with my partner, so I need to take every chance that comes up, right?

Twitter is down and I keep refreshing it every five minutes. What on earth has my life become?

There was some personal drama this week but I don't want to talk about it. Anyway, it has resolved itself. I just feel like I should mark these kinds of things down for future note, or something. "Yea, on the week of the 20th of February, 2011, Yuu was Involved with personal drama relating to So-and-So and Such-and Such and after a Certain Time and small amount of Discussion that particular Matter came to a successful Conclusion and the problem was thereby Solved."

Or something like that.

I've hardly been able to accomplish anything these past two days off because of people getting all up in my breathing space. Feels bad, man. I wish I could, y'know, just grab my computer and my notebook and mosey on down to the cafe like I used to do when I lived within walking distance of one.

My mother doesn't seem to understand the rules of movies (especially Hollywood movies).

"Why didn't he just jump on the train when it was moving slowly, so there wouldn't be any problems?!"

".... Because then there wouldn't be a movie, ma."

And she just doesn't let it go. And keeps asking all these ridiculous questions. "Who's that guy? What's happening? What's going to happen next?" Okay, look, if you'd sit down and shut up and pay attention, maybe your questions would be answered. I don't like watching movies with her. :T Though the annoying bits aren't the worst of it. The fact that she belittles me for not wanting to watch films with lots of violence (physical or psychological) pisses me off more. ... But let's not get into that.

I'd intended to have something written for 2/24, but that didn't work out. But it seems like this particular fic idea would be suited for August, so I'll try to finish that story for the summer.

The Nordic index is now up to date. And I realized I'd been neglecting the Baltic index, so I updated that. I've switched the browser I use for updating the Baltdex, and now transferring everything from the text version to Delicious is going to go so much faster. I got about 160 things bookmarked yesterday. Can hardly wait until this is all done.

That new official APH artbook looks pretty cool, ahhh. I kind of... want it. But I can't justify spending that money. I mean, who knows if I'll still be interested in this series after another year. (That's what I said last year, I think, but still).

Ngh, I want to go back to sleep.

Well. I did absolutely nothing today. I feel a bit like a bum for it, but on the other hand the school library was closed, and most places in town would be closed too I expect, on account of it being Good Friday, so I probably wouldn't have gotten much accomplished regardless. I'm recovering from that cold, but I'm still sick, so maybe it's better that I decided to take things easy.

In between homework I've managed to start watching Utena. This is one of those series that I saw a few episodes of when I was younger, thanks to parzi who copied her fansub tapes for me, but I never saw the entire series. So, I'm watching the whole thing now, from the beginning. I've fallen completely in love with it. I'm only up to epsiode 11 right now, so I've got quite a ways to go, but ahhhh I have a feeling this will be able to hold my attention - at least, I hope.

Yesterday, while I was waiting for the bus, I started writing something. This makes me so happy, even though my hand is protesting a bit. I only got maybe a page and a half done, but the fact remains, I wrote something. I'm going to keep going this way, just a page at a time - I don't want to push my hand too much. This story might be somewhat longish, but we'll see how it'll go. It has several things that I normally don't write (magic, genderflipping, het pairing) so it should be challenging and fun for me to write, even if it isn't exactly the most intellectual fanfic I've ever written, haaaa. (... Well, maybe it'll be fun to write because it's just a silly light romance. Probably!)

In other news, I spent most of today roleplaying, and I feel exhausted. Somehow really long threads just take so much out of me. On the other hand, I'm very glad that there are Certain Persons who are very willing to indulge my desire for Norway/Sweden interaction. Ohohoho. Though I do feel slightly guilty for keeping Sea up until 3 AM like that....

Scholar examines reports of solar eclipses in the Middle Ages

( Blah blah medieval stuff )

Still feeling incredibly nonsocial. SORRY GUYS. I guess I'm still in a funk.

To ease my woes I have been pretending to be a Scandinavian country on the internet. What is this I don't even. Hetalia, I love you, but you make my life weird in very subtle ways.

I have also made plans with pentatonikk. We are going to go to Wales. We will travel to it on the back of a giant magical talking fish, and have many adventures along the way, and it is going to be glorious.

Also, hi, it is 2:30 AM and I have an essay due on Tuesday morning and I am nowhere near even close to being halfway finished. Fuck me, what is this. HOWEVER at least it's on something that I know somewhat about. Though I do wish I hadn't left my copy of Shepherd's edition of Le Morte Darthur back at my mum's place. Though I'm also doing the presentation on this, and since I'll be visiting her soon, I'll be able to grab it while I'm there.

I was doing French today, and I kept getting so drawn out by the accent used in the program, because it's so French. Goddamnit, I'm used to hearing oui as "ouais", not "oui", and hearing it as "oui" is so damn jarring. Also, when I was learning it in school, we learned more informal forms of some phrases, rather than the formal. So, having the program tell me to write it as "Comment allez-vous?" rather than "Comment ça va?" throws me out of the whole thing and makes me go WUT. Ehhh that's the only one that really jumps out at me at the moment, though there are others. A lot of this is like, really really basic stuff, stuff I already know. But I'm still glad I'm doing the super-basic stuff first because there is a lot of stuff I forgot, or didn't know, like that there's an accent over the i in "s'il vous plaît". Back in high school I never bothered to take note of the accents because I am a horrible person.

Oh snap, it's getting late. I wonder what the French equivalent of "Oh snap" is. Or other equivalents! HEY PEOPLE WHO SPEAK STUFF OTHER THAN ENGLISH, PLEASE TELL ME WHAT IS THE EQUIVALENT PHRASE FOR "OH SNAP". I love the phrase because it's kind of like "oh shit", but not really; it seems it implies a more suddenness, like the sound of snapping, or being unexpectedly hit in the face with something.

... I think I really need to get to bed.