dragonimp

Now that I've had some space from 108 and stepped back for some breathing room, I realized a few things. Foremost, while there were some elements in the ending that left me with a sour taste, it doesn't change everything leading up to it. It's still an amazing series. It's been a long time since I've felt such a strong connection with a set of characters, and I don't think I've ever flailed so much month after month. It has a few tarnished edges and a cheap brass cap, but it's still mostly gold.

The anime - the first anime - falls apart in several places with plot and character, especially in the second half. But it is masterful at telling a story. Even when you're sitting there wondering how in the hell that plot point makes sense and who handed Al the idiot ball, you're still anxious for the next episode. And it kept that up all the way through to the end. The movie had a lot of problems and some cardboard characterization, but it's thrilling and compelling and damn fun to watch. AND it puts an appropriate finishing touch on the saga. Ironically, I didn't like the end of the movie because I found it too depressing, but by damn it fit the story. Happily Ever After is what fanfic is for. Canon needs to be true to itself.

Which brings me back to the manga. In contrast, the manga is expertly plotted and (forced romance aside) has excellent characterization throughout. We see the characters grow and change, but they always stay true to themselves. The storytelling is top-quality as well. It does drag in a few places, but it keeps you coming back and keeps you wanting more.

The ending, on the other hand, slips sideways and stumbles. It forgets what it is. Not completely, but enough to leave that sour taste. An ending shouldn't make you want to write fix-it!fic that makes things less perfect, but that's what it gives me.

But. Up until then, up until canon forgot itself, it's still an amazing piece of storytelling. Arakawa is still one of my idols - I can only wish I could plot that well. The manga is still as dear to me as the anime, and the sub-par ending doesn't change that.

(You might've noticed I didn't mention Brotherhood. It has some good moments, but is overall mediocre and disappointing. But mostly I left it out because it doesn't stand well on its own. It's supplementary material to the manga.)

We have bright shiny new double-paned argon windows! Unfortunately the clearing/installation/cleanup has pretty much eaten up both yesterday and today (as well as several hours earlier in the week) and my computer time has been limited. Yesterday my computer was off and pulled away from the wall for the whole morning and well into the afternoon, until I finally got to where I could shove the furniture back into position.

Of course this all means I didn't really get any writing done ^^;. But! I'm into the rewriting now.

I did get a start on the postcard which is my other obligation for help_haiti. That's going to have to go slowly, though.
(Zakai, I am working on that other picture, too, I haven't forgotten it! It's just, well, going to go slow.)

All right, my computer has issues whenever it's turned off for an extended period of time (it seems happiest when I leave it on for days and days, go fig) - I thought it was doing okay, but just now I noticed the Finder is not responding, and it wigged out when I tried to open iTunes earlier. So I'm going to have to restart, and then put it to sleep for the night, because it's gotten late.

Night, all.

I remember reading in Stephen King's On Writing the idea that we all write for a "perfect reader." His is his wife. It made a lot of sense to me because that's exactly what I do, or did. For original fiction, my perfect reader is my mom. She's also my editor.

But I realized I don't have that for fanfic (either one). I've unconsciously fallen into thinking I did a few times, only to be disappointed. I've tried to distance myself from it, but doing that is not easy and feels unnatural. I think it's only normal to write with someone in mind. So who am I writing for? Does it matter?

Not that I've been writing. I've been doing a lot of thinking about writing the last few days, but I haven't been able to get myself to sit down and put words to anything. Part of the problem is that I'm going to feel guilty no matter what I work on, and I haven't really wanted to deal with that. I know people are waiting for the fanfic, but Silver has been sitting for so long that anyone who might have been following it has probably given up. As far as I can tell, anyway. But this is my baby and I need to finish it.

Not that I've been completely unproductive. I rediscovered the joys of velour and pastel dust, and impossible to open fixative cans. I can't even express how it feels to be able to draw again. I still have to be careful, but it's not making me want to curl up and weep afterwards.

Tomorrow I will get back on the writing. Though on what, I'm not sure.

I realize I'm out of step with most people on the community art sites, in that I comment much more than I +fav. In fact I fav very rarely. I mean, they're supposed to be my favorites, right? It takes a lot more than a "oh hey, that's cool" reaction for something to be a favorite. I also - speaking from the other side - like getting comments much more than +favs, so that's the way I operate. It's not that I don't appreciate favs, but being one of fifty pictures the person added that day sort of lessens the impact. Plus, they're impersonal, and don't convey any feedback other than "I liked this."

I also sometimes have the urge to say, "out of all my artwork, you're +fav'ing that piece of crap?" But I realize it's a totally subjective process and there's no accounting for taste. But I start feeling more than a little cynical when quick doodles get more attention than the pieces I worked my ass off on.

Part of me is saying that I should be thankful for what little I get. Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful for any and all feedback. But the lack of rhyme and reason makes me cynical at times.

I'm having a hell of a time concentrating today. I'm about to just give up and go do housework :P.

Fandom seems to have invaded my dreams lately. Not in the sense of dreaming about FMA (though my subconscious did decide to try to rewrite the ending of Mother Arc the other night), but about you people on LJ. All the dreams seem to be centered around trying to get somewhere, too. It's - weird, and I'm not really sure what it means. Except that maybe my brain is fried.

For our final project for archiving we had to go through an unprocessed collection and write up an appraisal report. My group got the Jan Kerouac papers.

Can you imagine your life being reduced to a series of cartons, with people going through them, saying "tax forms ... medical receipts ... correspondences ... to-do lists and notebooks ... photographs ..." It's kinda surreal. I don't think it can ever really give a complete view of a person's life. I know if anyone got a hold of my journal - my paper journal, not this LJ - they would get a very fractured and skewed view of things. I've had this particular journal since 2001. It's not very thick, only about a half-inch of pages, and I'm not even halfway through it. I tend to only write in it when I'm particularly upset or bothered by something, and then not always. I go for months - years - without making an entry.

Of course, that's not all an archive is interested in. After they got over their disgust at seeing the state in which I kept my records, an archivist might actually find a few things of interest. There's all my drawings and sketches, of course. Print-outs of various iterations of various stories, some marked up, some clean. I so rarely throw anything away - but I so rarely keep anything in order, either. And of course, in this day and age, they'd have to take electronic records into account, too. My hard drive is much better organized than my house.

But there's also so much that simply doesn't ever get documented. No photographs, no letters, no lists, no videos. I can imagine watching from the "other side" and laughing as people tried to puzzle me out, knowing that they're simply missing the majority of the picture.

But then, maybe not. Our possessions can say more about us than we realize.

We had our first thunderstorm of the season yesterday. It was kinda pathetic, actually. Or rather, it had two impressive moments, but was also impressive in its brievity. We had two peals of thunder - the first one was a long, drawn-out rumble - a suddening downpour of huge drops, big enough to sound like hail, and then, ten minutes later . . . nothing. Come on, I want a storm! A big, serious rainstorm that requres raincoats and umbrellas, the kind that make us worry the flat top roof's gonna back up! (okay, I really don't want the roof to back up and leak again, but you get the idea.) Last year's rainy season was pathetic.