Previously, in Trip's Life...
31 March 2018 - Saturday
It's Easter Eve (what? why is that not a thing?) so I went to Monkeycat
Mountain a little early to help the children dye eggs. There was a lot of
fighting, because siblings, but also eggs became colorful.
- Sailor Moon S 10: And now, heteronormativity for Rei!
- The Ancient Magus's Bride: Those Awaiting A Star 2:
Rewatch for Marith. Still very pretty.
- Flip Flappers 9: Yayaka's backstory.
- My Hero Academia 1.9: The worst foe a superhero can face:
the media!
- ACCA 2: Ayse and Ken like this, so I guess we'll keep
watching it!
Beasts of Abigaile vol 1 (Spica Aoki): "Your keywords for
this shoujo manga are: wolf, prison, and rose. Start writing!"
Words: 382.
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30 March 2018 - Friday
Perhaps appropriately, The Lost Plot (Genevieve Cogman)
leaves the overarching plot of the last few books behind and dives into
draconic intrigue. Also, bootleggers. And giant wolves. And maybe some
progress on the UST.
I have been putting the harness on Ghirardelli when he tries to
investigate the Outside, but that usually results in him sitting down and
not going anywhere. Tonight I waited until he got all the way down the
stairs without the harness, then carried him back upstairs, put the
harness and leash on him, and carried him back to where he was to let him
keep exploring, and he did! Not that we got more than about 5m from the
bottom of the stairs, but he sniffed hedges and sidewalks and laundry
vents very successfully!
Words: 259. I had to walk the cat!
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29 March 2018 - Thursday
Words: 421. I thought I was being clever in breaking this up into scenes
the way Scrivener makes
easy, but now I think I was wrong. Perhaps tomorrow's writing will be
mooshing everything together into one thing so I can get good flow.
Which day's writing will be learning to end scenes instead of writing
the whole story in one single continuous shot?
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28 March 2018 - Wednesday
Small
Worlds and its continuation (not really a sequel)
Strange
Cosmology (Alex Raizman) are about a hapless schmoe who, after a
cursed life, finds a thing that makes him a god and also responsible for
dealing with the end of the world. Things get worse from there.
I am caught up on this and will probably keep reading it, but it didn't
get my vote on Top Web Fiction even
though it's at second place overall.
Words: 326. But although it is easy to write more on the scenes of how
my protagonist came to be in the media of all this res (I am keeping the
slowly-remembering-while-discovering-the-extent-of-her-doom opening), I
have the feeling that a good writer would edit them all down to evocative
snippets, and possibly not in any particular order.
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27 March 2018 - Tuesday
Avalon is still working way too much, but her feets are operational, so
that's something.
The Squidder (Ben Templesmith) is set in a world where the
tentacle monsters from another dimension have won, but although there is
definite horror, it is not nearly cosmic enough.
Generation Witch vol 1 (Uta Isaki) is
slice-of-high-school-life in a modern world where some people can do
magic. Whatever.
Words: 191.
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26 March 2018 - Monday
I somehow managed to go to bed at a reasonable hour last night, and yet
I am still sleepy this morning. That doesn't seem fair.
Heretical
Edge is kind of a cross between Buffy the Vampire Slayer
and Harry Potter and maybe Stargate? (It's still
ongoing, so I suppose more genres might get added later.) Secret school,
magic, monster hunters (and thus monsters), obscured and dramatic ancestry,
getting superpowers from murder, indiscriminate use of memory magic, aliens
with strange abilities, interstellar empires, ancient curses, the whole
eleven yards. Also, lesbian poly.
Words: 437.
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25 March 2018 - Sunday
This week in PAD&D5,
Dave did not have to eschew cookies!
As predicted, there is a big fight (in fact, the big fight, as
the Heroines have gone so far out of their way to avoid it that they end up
running into it from behind) but hardly anyone dies. Rimardo does not even
fall into a deep pit this time, although there is one conveniently to hand.
Then, having gained control of some wandering damage
combat resources from the [SPOILER], the Heroines decide to throw them into the
room they have not yet been willing to assault and set them off (metaphorically
speaking). Of course it then turns out that someone they especially wanted to
take prisoner is in that room, so there is a tense fight against the most fearsome
foe, but Rimardo saves the day with daring and the power of the Crystal
Dragon!
Laden with captives (mostly) and loot (a little), the Heroines head back to
Yartar.
Apparently that finished off this chapter? wing? of the adventure, so we
reaped a great bounty of XP. Level UP!
Some third-level paladin spells are actually pretty cool. Maybe I'll have Lam
cast some now, instead of just spending the slots for +4d8 radiant damage.
Made in Abyss (Akihito Tsukushi) is about an amnesiac
cyborg from a 20,000-meter pit full of excessive carnivores and ancient
artifacts, and the orphan girl who finds him. They seek adventure.
Words: 164.
Weekly total: 2331. But maybe it's all wrong again.
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24 March 2018 - Saturday
We only share about 1/713th of a language, but I think the usual
cleaning person is changing jobs, so now someone different will be coming
fortnightly. I hope whoever it is appreciates Ghirardelli properly!
Because I was very slow and lethargic, I didn't manage to do grocery
shopping in a timely fashion, but on the other hand I didn't have to trundle
down to Monkeycat Mountain. They all came to
Yuki Sushi for sushi
feasting, along with Marith and Earl and Cat! (I got to sit next to
Nonny!) Then we went back to Monkeycat Mountain for pie and videos.
- Sailor Moon S 9: They almost teamed up! But not quite.
- Nirvana in Fire 31-32: If you want something done right,
don't lapse into unconsciousness and leave it to your minions!
Words: 158. But I have sugar-free chocolate cream pie!
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23 March 2018 - Friday
Yesterday was doctor for me, today is doctor for cats. Cats are not
good at taking the bus, so I scheduled for when Marith is off and can help
transport them, but that meant going in the middle of the day, which meant
working from home, which is bleah.
Poor cats! So oppressed! But at least you have crunchyfood now!
Words: 244.
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22 March 2018 - Thursday
I succumbed to capitalism and scheduled my doctor appointment first
thing in the morning so I could still go to work at a reasonable hour (for
some value of "reasonable"), so I had to get up at a time that by
definition was still night. Blugh. Anyway, things are blargh. I should go
to other specialists for stuff, and also find some kind of exercise that
gets my heart rate up.
Words: 430.
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21 March 2018 - Wednesday
New personal high score!
No Brooks for 13th Age, but
Mike brought barbecue
instead. (For the record, Brooks's roleplaying ability is much greater than
that of a foil container of pulled chicken.)
This session, we got through some more plants and had the fight with the
huge pile of cultists, and crushed them all in like three rounds, because
mooks. Next session, probably everything catches on fire.
Words: 180. However, being 48 has not apparently made my writing any
less terrible.
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20 March 2018 - Tuesday
Words: 566.
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19 March 2018 - Monday
Words: 589. Hey, that was almost like focusing! But am I blathering too much
about stuff that should be hurried past?
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18 March 2018 - Sunday
Look, it's a Sunday without gaming! That means I will be completely
useless!
As part of being useless, I watched Big Hero 6, which I
have had from Netflix for approximately one million years. It wasn't bad,
although there were way too many male characters (what is even the point?).
The visuals for the [SPOILER] were pretty cool, and Baymax is indeed
adorable.
Words: 307. See, useless.
Weekly total: 1887.
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17 March 2018 - Saturday
Apparently Crunchyroll crashed under the load of ten million
whippersnappers binge-streaming the 783-828th episodes of One
Piece, so we could only watch things we happened to have on
physical media. So primitive!
- Sailor Moon S 7-8: We had to explain to Jus that Usagi
thinks there's a rule against girls dating girls, but really there
isn't. So who says anime isn't educational?
- Free! 1-2: Ayse has wanted to watch this since before
Crunchyroll was a thing, which is why we had it on disc
What with starting ACCA and now Free! without
ending any series, I'm not sure the slot-based method of
managing our anime is going to keep working. Maybe I should just keep a
list of the last episode watched of each show that has more episodes and
call it a day.
Inked Tails and Penned Dragons (Brian Kesinger)
are more picture books in the same style as Walking With Your
Octopus (for some reason), but about mermaids and dragons,
respectively. They are pretty silly.
Words: 374. But at the beginning, it all seems so obvious, and only
later do I realize that it is all made of 100% fail.
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16 March 2018 - Friday
I showed up at the St Patrick's Day party for work for a little
while, but fled before they could make me participate in any kind of
"fun".
On the upside, it looks like the indie bookstore I shopped at in Mountain
View is opening a branch right next to where I get groceries, only a
few blocks from work!
Words: 329.
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15 March 2018 - Thursday
Avalon still works practically all the time. It is very sad. Also I
feel like a loser because I have many hours of free time every week, and
never do anything with them.
Words: 109. I know more or less what to write, I just can't stop being a
lump. Also, this cat is not helping. (But he is very fluffy.)
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14 March 2018 - Wednesday
We had everyone for Thai food and 13th Age, hurray!
This session, we proved not quite cunning enough to find and use the
shortcut, but at least we avoided most of the painful parts of the long way
around and only lost some time.
Imposter Syndrome (Mishell Baker) finishes the "Arcadia
Project" trilogy, or at least seems like it wraps up pretty much
everything with the plot, even if the main character is still a huge
mess. But she's a slightly more functional mess, and also a triumphant
one.
Words: 117. Writing after I get home from gaming is hard. Maybe I
should get around to installing Scrivener on my pad and try to write
some before gaming? But that is social time. Or I could give up on
having a non-deferable daily quota, puny as it is. Ugh.
Make a comment!
13 March 2018 - Tuesday
For the first time in a long while, I went up to the northern office,
lured by poached pear sour cream caramel pie (Pi Day, observed). The commute
was annoying, but at least it was raining instead of hot, and neither bus
nor train failed me.
The pie was pretty amazing.
Tricks for Free (Seanan McGuire) is partly about the
fallout from the previous book in the "InCryptids" series and partly
about how Antimony can't stay out of trouble to save anyone's life,
especially not her own. Plus, theme park madness!
Words: 218. I got back late because northern office, so my brain
wasn't working very well. (Yes, yes, goes without saying.)
pie by marithlizard (Thu Mar 15 06:02:54 2018)
That pie does sound amazing, and I vote we should get Ken to make it for us.
Make a comment!
12 March 2018 - Monday
Bah, No-Sleep Monday. Nobody likes it. Everybody hates it. Too many
dumb customers.
Words: 433, somehow. By doing individual scenes which I will then try to
assemble into the initial flashback chapter, I have some things. Kind
of.
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11 March 2018 - Sunday
Ugh, Moonlight Squandering Time. Bleah.
Despite the unnatural hour, everyone was present for this week's episode
of PAD&D5!
For lack of a better plan, the Heroines of Red Larch go back down
into the [SPOILER], where they end up engaging in a real old-fashioned
dungeon crawl: mapping, distinct encounters, all the treasure hoarded by
monsters too tough to beat. The final encounter brings them back into
conflict with the main body of the [SPOILER], but at least they are able
to begin defeating them in detail. Next fortnight, there will probably
be a huge fight and everyone will die.
Traveling With Your Octopus (Brian Kesinger) is the sequel
to Walking Your Octopus, with the green-haired steampunk
girl and her cheerful octopus modelling local costumes and customs
around the world.
Words: 145.
Weekly total: 1300. That is indeed a weak total.
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10 March 2018 - Saturday
- Sailor Moon S 5-6: More monster of the week. Jus scorns
the main villain's evil laugh as feeble.
- Ancient Magus' Bride: Those Awaiting A Star 1: Rewatch for
Marith who missed it the first time.
- My Hero Academia 1.8: Ensemble cast power montage! I
caught hardly any of them, but I might still like Frog Girl the best.
- Flip Flappers 8: Now that we have a firmer idea what
Pure Illusion is, we understand the first couple of episodes better,
maybe.
- ACCA 1: Marith and I saw this, but she thought the
other might like it, and they seem to. Not sure whether we're going to
keep watching it, but we might.
Words: 146. Poke. Poke.
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9 March 2018 - Friday
Yay, Avalon is still alive! Mostly.
Words: 152.
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8 March 2018 - Thursday
Words: Well, complaining in yesterday's entry about how I have no idea
how to write things took up 311 words... No idea what I will do with
tomorrow. Dying in a pit still seems good, honestly.
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7 March 2018 - Wednesday
Kelsey cancelled at the last minute, unsurprisingly, but we played
13th Age anyway,
and also ate tacos until we exploded, after playing a little
Codenames to
establish that my brain is transparent and tiny (like a marble) but
Dave has 80% inscrutibility.
This session, we confirmed the lack of physical evidence at the site of the
missing plant, so the magic types did crazy wizard stuff while Kazannethorim
rolled her eyes at them. Then we had to go through the magical gate to the
upside-down ziggurat anyway, and discover that it is next to a second sun,
patrolled by flaming undead, and full of chanting cultists that seemed about to
sacrifice a vampire to empower the plant we want. Next session, all the
fighting!
Words: 188 into the optimistically-titled restart.txt, but I don't
think I can count those as progress of any kind. Maybe I need to restart
even further back? Or rather, discard even more of my existing ideas
instead of reworking them.
How do you become a supervillain, anyway? As step zero, you need powers and
a costume (some powers, like a glowing forcefield or Monster Out, count as a costume
as well); without that, you're just a criminal. A nom de spandex is optional,
the Internet will be glad to give you one if you're lacking.
But that just gets you to super. How do you get to villain? You can just
announce it, I guess, although I don't know what the appropriate occasion would
be. Join an existing villain team. Fight a superhero, or at least thwart one. Help
a supervillain. And, of course, do a crime. What else? How can I get my main
character sucked into a life of supervillainy without meaning to?
Maybe it's just doomed to be uninteresting if her parents are already
villains, but I like Slink. Florn!
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6 March 2018 - Tuesday
Because I obviously don't have enough web serials to read, I picked up
A Practical Guide to
Evil
(David Verburg?). In this fantasy world, the gods of Good and Evil
sometimes give people the power and luck (not good luck, but appropriate)
to live out archetypal roles: the Warlock, the Exiled Prince, the Augur,
the Black Knight, the Lone Brooding Swordsman, etc. A couple of generations
ago, the dark empire, which was mostly a laughingstock on account of being
ruled by people who take names like Malicia or Terribilous, finally got
some practical people in major roles, who transformed the Legions
of Terror from marauding orc warbands to a professional military, and
otherwise tried to get things organized instead of horrifying, and
consequently stomped all over everyone. Now a young girl from one of the
conquered lands wants to rise in the Empire so she can lessen the oppresion
of her people...
The Roles and Names are meta to the readers, but to the characters,
that's just how the world works, and they deal with it as best they can,
so it avoids being parody by a wide margin. And really, isn't that just
the sort of crap gods would pull?
Words:
149, but today I realized that most of what I have written so far is made of
fail. I mean, it's always been badly-written and deficient in social justice,
that hasn't changed, but very few of the however-the-heck-many words I've
written since last October are moving my main character toward being either a
supervillain or a superhero. This may mean I should start over AGAIN. Or, you
know, die in a pit forever.
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5 March 2018 - Monday
Walking Your Octopus (Brian Kesinger) is a cute picture
book about a steampunk young lady and her pet (air-breathing land) octopus.
The octopus seems happy to help with all kinds of chores, which makes me
wonder about Dave.
The last couple of Spectrums have had a lot of art I
didn't much care for, but
Spectrum 24 (ed John Fleskes) moves back in the direction of my
tastes. it's still very diverse, of course, despite being at least 37% MtG
cards by weight (seriously, it seems like WotC is guaranteeing full employment
for every fantasy artist with an even vaguely realistic style), but it has
less of the stuff I don't like. On the other hand, I didn't feel compelled
to buy any of the books whose cover art was selected, so maybe
Spectrum has failed after all.
Words:
209.
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4 March 2018 - Sunday
Today, I did nothing! Because I suck!
Okay, I did watch a couple of episodes of
Darling in the Franxx, which tumblr has been buzzing about a
little. It reminds me of Chrome-Shelled Regios, with the
domed cities amid the barren monster-haunted wasteland of the entire
world. I'm not sure pair-piloting mecha needed to be sexualized quite that
much, though, and I say that as a huge perv. (And why always male-female
pairs? And in the same commander(?)-driver(?) roles? (The male lead isn't
terrible so far, but I'm pretty sure everything would be much better if
Zero Two had picked a female "darling". (Male characters, bah!)))
Words:
508.
Weekly total: 2756. Unfortunately, I have reached the point where I
need to know what the antagonists are actually up to. Maybe there's
another project I can work on instead?
Make a comment!
3 March 2018 - Saturday
- Sailor Moon S 3-4: What?! Haruka is a [SPOILER]?! Who
could have ever guessed?!
- Monthly Girl's Nozaki-kun 12: The end! Not a very
conclusive one, but then Nozaki is Nozaki.
- My Hero Academia 1.6-7: Right into full-contact combat
exercises on the first day of school, as one should expect from All Might!
- Flip Flappers 7: Well, that explanation was not very
explanatory. But I don't think the characters understood it either.
Words:
264.
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2 March 2018 - Friday
I'm up to book 4 (I Am Half-Sick of Shadows) of "Flavia de
Luce" and still liking them okay, although I might take a break. They are
very much what they are.
Words:
527.
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1 March 2018 - Thursday
Hurray, it's Avalon! But she still lives far away.
Words:
278.
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