MILES to GO || before I sleep

I'm almost done with His Dark Materials, the trilogy by Philip Pullman including "The Golden Compass," "The Subtle Knife," and "The Amber Spyglass." I do think they read together better as an omnibus-- or at least 2 and 3 do, because the ending of 1 was "okay," while 2 just sort of... well, "cut off," pun not intended.

I've got a ton of other books to read at some point, many of them purchases from when I was in San Francisco, including Candace Bushnell's Lipstick Jungle, The Thirteenth Tale, the second In Death book, "Glory In Death," "The Historian," the rest of the "Book of the Dead," Susan Issac's "Long Time No See" (at Baba's recommendation), and "Girl Sleuth: Nancy Drew and the Women Who Created Her," which I'm finding is a very fun, informative read on one of my favorite childhood heroines.

Today at Borders, I also picked up a bunch of manga (another one of those 5-for-4 sales), though I'm still holding off on Fullmetal Alchemist and its associated novels, since I want to wait for the whole series to be finished. Besides, I technically don't have enough bookshelf space for what I have... it's kind of embarrassing (but cool! Because who doesn't want to have their own personal library? Mine is killer! :D). I also picked up "Codebreaker," about -what else?- codes and ciphers and their history. That purchase was, of course, inspired by seeing "National Treasure: Book of Secrets." I actually love puzzles (logic puzzles are my favorite-- I'm not much one for crosswords, though I am a little good at Sudoku), and I think that's sort of come out in WDKY's Téa, because I've had her solve her father's riddles in order to unravel a family mystery (and save Seto on the side, of course). In thinking about the future of WDKY, I'm thinking, if Téa didn't become a dancer, what would she be? There could be any number of reasons why she might not dance, and I thought she might end up as a cryptanalyst or similar. It'd be a fun way of having her one-up Kaiba in many ways-- genius of one area vs. genius of... well, Kaiba's sort of an all-around guy, but hey! :D

Speaking of fanfiction, I've started revisions on an old Sailor Moon fic of mine, "Hogosha no Kokoro," or HnK for short. Originally, the title was SUPPOSED to translate to "Guardian of the Heart," but that was back before I fully understood Japanese and the function (and positioning) of noun modifiers. So technically, it translates to "Guardian's Heart," or "Heart of [the] Guardian," but I guess that's okay, too, even though the meaning is a bit different from what I intended. In any case, I explain the mixup in my Author's Notes, and add "Guardian of the Heart," as the story's subtitle. I figure I could change it to what it was meant to be (Kokoro no Hogosha), but that doesn't have quite the same ring to it, and besides, if I were to abbreviate it the way I do for my other fics (like WDKY), it would be GotH. o_o Yeah, I have a "Goth" story. Great.

Anyway, I'm not sure why I picked this one over any of my other SM fics-- heck knows they all need revising, but HnK has great possibilities as an AR Silver Millennium Fic. No, I'm not going to try and make it fit with the current theme of sm_monthly (which I've almost consistently had ideas for, but never gotten around to actually writing/posting).

( Read more... )

So I'm working hardcore on Epiphany, my fanworks archive... which I would LOVE to get up before, say, New Year's. And I'm happy to announce that my overhauling of the categories is going quite well. Right now, I've got it divided up by fandoms, like so:

( fun fandom )

It sucks when you get into a new pairing (this is the second in so many months) and you might find ONE or TWO fics that have a decent plot and spelling and grammar that doesn't make you cringe. Maybe the copy-editor in me has set standards too high, because I went through ALL of the M-rated fics in a C2 community devoted to Albel x Nel from Star Ocean 3 (TTEOT) and I was lucky to find anything halfway readable. Nothing worth reviewing, though, and thus, nothing to "write home about."

Why is it I keep seeing the same carelessness in fics? Whatever happened to showing your love of canon, your pride regarding your pairing (crack or not), and basic rules for clarity? I mean, even if you write just to get a plotbunny out of your head, you're still posting for the public- everyone knows there's the potential for reviews, or why else post it online in the first place, especially at a place like FFnet? Why else say things like "R&R" or "No flames!"? (And frankly, I find the last one stupid. Unless you've written something you know will "warrant" flames, why say it? You're basically asking for it when you say "Don't flame me!" because it really translates to: "Don't say anything if it's not mindless praise and useless drivel! I can't take constructive criticism and will tell you of all my illnesses and tragedies if you accuse me of forgetting to spell-check!")

It bugs me to no end when I see not just some simple, scattered spelling and grammar errors, but constant, repeated things within the first few paragraphs. In what I've seen lately with AlNel fics, it's stuff that's not specific to the fandom in any way, and could affect anyone, any time:

* Tense shifts. It's really, really jarring. I honestly think a simple proofread would solve this. Why don't people ever re-read their fics before they post? I do that many times over with my fics; it's how I catch most of my errors before I send the chapter off to a beta!

* Wrong word, wrong spelling, bad grammar. I saw "hallowed" instead of "hollowed." Yes, I know it's just a letter of difference, and from context, I understood the proper meaning, but still, since it's so easily FIXABLE, why not? A spell-checker won't catch it; you need to be diligent as a writer or have a beta who knows English! Why? Because something with an empty inside is much different from something that is considered sacred and respected. And of course, mixed up words like your, you're, their, they're, there always piss me off. GET THEM RIGHT! I also hate seeing it's or its used improperly. I'm just glad I have yet to see anyone use its'. And people who mix up words that should just LOOK wrong automatically like in this phrase: "They where sitting down next to the grapebind tree." What's wrong with that phrase? If you can't tell me, you fail. (And no, it's not the "grapebind," part, that's actually the name of a variety of tree in SO3. This is obviously something grammatical.)

* OOC. It bugs me when people say "yeah, they're a little OOC," and then they apologize, bitch about it, or say "fuck off" to the readers in some form or fashion. With most pairings, OOC means they're not the characters we're reading FOR anymore. Albel Nox and Nel Zelpher have such distinct personalities, to make them OOC in the slightest detracts from any quality the story may have had in its plot, writing style, etc. It's like cheapening a fine wine with seltzer water.

For those unfamiliar with the pairing, Albel Nox is the captain of a military power's infantry branch, known as the Black Brigade. He's a feared, ruthless killer with an incredible prowess with the katana and an ego that matches his reputation. But he's got a dark past and a thirst for bloodshed that are his weaknesses.

Nel Zelpher works for the country on the other side of the war, a country called Aquaria. She's a loyal woman, hard-working and strong, but she can occasionally come off as cold. She's also got a biting attitude sometimes. Her father died (technically without her knowing), so she, too, has a bit of a sad past. Unlike Albel, she's not missing any limbs or anything, but her ego's not as huge, even though she is well known as a spy and as the fierce edge of the renowned "Crimson Blade."

To take any of that away from them is to lose what makes them unique, tough characters, and then what's the point of writing fanfiction about them (or people with their names, at least) at all?

* "Guide to my writing." I used to do this when I was younger. But seriously, why the hell do people feel the need to mention that speech will be in "double quotes," thoughts will be 'italicized and in single quotes,' and things like lyrics, other languages, text messages, etc. will be bold/enclosed in brackets/marked off with asterisks, etc.? Ninety percent of the time, it's understood from context! I don't need someone instructing me on basic writing/English! (And for the record, I've written and even enjoy some songfics, but nowadays I'm seeing very little need to include lyrics --or at least huge chunks of them-- in fics. It's much easier to say "This fic was inspired by/has a scene inspired by XYZ by Artist A." Plus, you're not breaking copyright infringement by reprinting lyrics, then. And as an added bonus, there are no extra parts to bold/italicize/whatever to mark them off as lyrics (assuming your reader was too dumb to figure it out otherwise).

* High School fics/Movie or TV-based fics - I really wish this would end. When you take characters from a sword-and-sorcery-based world and try and dump them into a modern high school, modern hospital, or any other "modern" situation, it just ruins their characters. Albel Nox IS WHO HE IS because of WHERE HE WAS BORN, HOW HE WAS RAISED, AND WHAT HE HAS GONE THROUGH. You can't call him "Albel the Wicked" if he's pretending to be House, M.D. Nel wouldn't be who she is if she were years younger and some floozy at Aquios High. Parodies, yes, I can understand that, but... a real fic? It's one thing to dump the characters in a universe that the characters can still somewhat be fit into, but for a game like SO3, it's just not possible with these. Yet I've seen House, M.D., Cast Away, high school fics... ugh.

* Earth-based... - Okay, there's off-worlders like Fayt, Cliff, et. al. in SO3, but that doesn't mean that they're going to introduce a holiday like Valentine's Day/Christmas/etc. to Elicoor. And even if they did introduce it to Nel, Albel, or a city/a country, there's no telling if it would take, or if there wasn't already some sort of similar holiday in place! Consider the circumstances under which holidays developed on Earth. Without the same meaning on Elicoor, what's the point? Why would anyone place any significance to them, or care? Why would anyone ACT on them? It's stupid. It's MUCH easier, if you must have an excuse to write seasonal romance or whatnot, to invent a brand-new holiday. You can take elements of Valentine's Day, for example, and modify it to make something brand new. Even around the world, holidays aren't the same. So why not start with bits and pieces of one holiday and how it's celebrated around the world, and mush them all together? Or take multiple holiday traditions and mush them together? What if people on Elicoor celebrate a day of love in their coldest month, and partake of a chocolate treat after lighting candles on a tree? And what if it's called Eyun, or Rashul Day? It doesn't have to be "Valentine's" or "Christmas," or anything like that. (BTW, remember that Earth in SO3 is several centuries ahead of "modern time" anyway, so who's to say that holidays like those are even celebrated anymore, or if they are, that they're celebrated in even the remotely same way? Christmas now isn't celebrated like it was originally, that's for damn sure.)

* "Bad at summary's. Read." Er, no, I'll pass. Seriously, all a summary is: a single sentence briefly describing the plot of your story. And you know what? It can come in different forms. I know one summary that was a line from the story, but it was so unusual, it drew me in. It can be one of those standard "questions," where you put a character in a situation and then ask if they can get out of it somehow. BUT IT SHOULD NOT BE: a string of pairing names, emoticons, ellipses, references to friends/inside jokes, re-hashed information from canon, song lyrics, or a single word/short phrase having nothing to do with your story (again, such as the pairing name). Same goes for the title, too. MAKE IT RELEVANT. It's not hard.

Summaries also don't need to include irrelevant details (unless it's what makes your story unique, and frankly I DOUBT IT) like whose POV the story is written in, what there are spoilers for (seriously, that's what author notes are for), why it's rated the way it is, etc. It CAN include things like the fact that a chapter is new or revised, if the story is on hiatus or will never be finished, and so on. But it should basically give the reader a reason to read, a reason why your story should be picked out of the trash that is FFnet these days.

There are a ton of other things, too, like eLiTE caps, Random Capitals in the Middle of a Phrase or sentence!, misspellings of canonical things (Airyglyph, not Airigliph, Airygliph, etc.; Fayt, not Fate, Elicoor, not Elicloor, etc.), lack of/bad punctuation (thats, well for we'll, etc.), too much punctuation (*!*!*!xxStoryTitlexx*!*!*!)

I hate to say it, but it's not that much better on most private archives I found. That makes me sad that either writers of this pairing are so lazy, the good writers are so few and far between, and/or the moderators of outside archives aren't stringent. This is why I have an approval queue for Dragonfayth, and why I beta things that are on the verge of being good, but just need some (hopefully minor) changes. Sometimes I'm too nice and I really overhaul a story rather than rejecting it-- I've done it multiple times now with an author who apparently doesn't read the explanations I make an effort to include in my rejection letters.

I'm thinking that contribution to fandom is multi-fold:
* How-To articles on what makes the best fanfiction for X pairing or Y fandom-- just the basics, like what I mentioned above, not things like "The plot must be Z!" or "Character A should act exactly like THIS, all the time!"

* Contribution of your own work.

* Recognition and recommendation of others' work, because it can't be all that bad.

All of the above makes me want to get Epiphany up that much faster, because all of that can be in place with Epiphany. If only I didn't feel so damn tired and busy all the time. Playing SO3 lately has been my only relief, even though I know I tend to procrastinate when I play (e.g. sorting B&G's bills, working on my J371 project which is due next week, etc.)

*SIGH!* This entry has too many asterisks in it.

It's funny how my memory is so Swiss-Cheesed that I can't remember saying or doing certain things that, to others, are clear indicators of my behavior or attitudes (towards things, people, etc). So I figure that by journaling, I can always have a written retrospective, in my own voice, of the things that are going on in my life day-to-day. Alas, I can't always update, but when I can, it's just as much for me (to vent, announce things, ask questions, whatever) as it is for others (who might be interested for whatever reason). I hate how I forget things so easily... I wonder if there really is something wrong with my brain, or if I'm just not smart, or not eating enough prunes or something...

I almost had a fit today because I had to upgrade my eFiction installs for both Dragonfayth and Epiphany. Usually it's not that big of a deal, but when eFic upgraded from 2.0.7 to 3.0, it took a lot of work, and it really stressed me out. The patch update (3.0.1) wasn't so bad, but I don't like the idea of replacing ALL the files, over and over again, when I have made edits to the skins or variables files (and so on). Anyway, I'd come up with this decent skin organization structure, which works like so:
efic3-drfa+epiphany (folder in which all the eFic files are)
--skins (the skins folder normally has EACH skins individual folders in here, i.e. CSS Zen, elegance, Zenlike. But since I have 2 different eFic sites and I DO NOT want to waste HD space by having them in two separate folders, I changed the layout of the skins folder to look like the following...)
---drfa (the skin folders I plan to use for drfa go in here. However, it's ONLY the files that are modified, i.e. the images folder and the style.css)
---epiphany (works the same way as the drfa folder)
---efic general skins (all the files that are used in skins but are NOT modified for each individual site. These are the files that are normally in /skinname/ in the uploaded site's skins folder.)

So I downloaded 3.0.2 and prepared to replace everything. I figured since I had those 3 special sub-folders in the skins folder (instead of the default skin names, which are CSS Zen, elegance, Zenlike, and SurpriseMe), it would just add the new skins to the skins/ folder, and leave MY modified structure alone. Apparently not! I don't know if it's something up with Finder/OSX or something else, but it replaced all my folders, even though MY folders didn't exist in the 3.0.2 update! It makes no sense...

Anyway, it stressed me out because I had to think of a way to get all my changes back without having to do them again, so I basically DOWNLOADED the images folders for each skin, the style.css for each skin (I hope no changes were made to the skins' style.css for the 3.0.2 update), and did my structure again. And when I uploaded the new files to Dragonfayth (and I will for Epiphany when the DRFA upload completes), I had to do it in pieces, or else risk messing up the file structure again. It's a pain in the ass and totally gave me a headache, but I'm trying to avoid MORE of a headache by having to do things over and over.

Once the second half of the Dragonfayth upload finishes, I'll see how everything worked out... hopefully nothing will be mangled, and I can just repeat the process for Epiphany.

Well, that didn't work. First I got a 404 for not uploading the install folder (I thought the install and skin folders were the two things you DON'T upload with every upgrade, major or minor!? I only uploaded the latest skin folders -minus the images and style.css- because Tammy said she makes fixes on those default skins on occasion). When I uploaded it, I got a header sent/session cache limiter error-- fatal, which means NO ONE can access the site. Ugh.

I'm off to a great start, don't you think?
Broke
Stressed
Forgetful
Lonely
Hungry
Procrastinating
Uncreative
Messy
Sad
Frustrated
Fucked