SO HEY GANG

Apparently I haven't updated since... uh. Early June. My bad.

For the three or so people reading, you haven't missed much in the uneventfulness that is my life. I'm still a drifter, but my graphic-design skills have improved considerably and I'm learning a shit-ton more about astrology and the thought that I really have no idea what I'm talking about, ever. I made a snazzy new layout that I intend to keep, too! gives this place a more... 'bloggish' feel.

mellow mellow mellow
Check it out!

There's no navigation bar, but don't let that mislead you— I still read the f-list on occasion, but I've found there's not much reason to have links present as nobody posts all that much aside from the feeds I watch. Inksome has become a truly dead place (especially in the wake of Dreamwidth), but I hope to brighten it a little with a review or two every once in a while. I've got one or two still in the works, which should eventually be posted. Eventually.

As for what I'm doing in the meantime, I'm pretty content just reading Oh No They Didn't and watching the odd series here and there, listening to the odd musician. MJ died a few weeks ago and that's been making a lot of headlines lately. On one hand I'd love for people to just let the guy rest in peace, but I know that's not gonna happen— people are media whores, they feed off of tabloid stories and any opportunity to get their name in. Celebs are popping up out of the woodwork with the intention to make a quick publicity stunt out of their brief encounters with him... it's almost sickening, but that's just the way it goes, isn't it? I wonder where all these 'friends' of his were when he was actually alive and needing the support. ... On the other hand, you never do realize what you've got until it's gone. The world has, without a doubt, lost an amazing entertainer and a loving dad— and with him, an era has died as well. I'm just sad that some could only seem to appreciate his work in death. He's sold like 9 million albums since the news broke out, still dominating the charts.

I think the only thing more sad than the lack of appreciation before is the type that's been continuing after. The jokes, the persecution. If anyone actually bothered to do the research and look ahead of the gossip, they'd realize just how dumb the whole thing is. Al Sharpton really said it best at the Staples Center memorial;

"I want his children to know... wasn't anything strange about your Daddy: it was strange, what your Daddy had to deal with. But he dealt with it anyway. He dealt with it for us."

As for the people taking the Peter King "we have better things to worry about" side, I don't have much to say other than the fact that, honestly, let's be real here: Nobody was bothering to provide coverage for Iraq a day before— if he hadn't died then, they wouldn't have expanded on it a day later. Nobody complains when the Gosselins and other celebs are making news, and they're barely relevant as-is. I guess this decade of privacy MJ took just really made people forget who he was, and that for a good twenty or thirty years, he was relevant. I'm not saying politics aren't important, but you can't pretend that he wasn't. Just because you didn't like him or didn't grow up with him doesn't override the generation that did. Need I remind everyone that the guy, to this day, can still boast to having made the best-selling album of all time?

TODAY'S REVIEW:


SO I JUST WATCHED THE FIRST (and only, broadcast so far) EPISODE OF GLEE.

Eh, it's alright. I felt like I was watching High School Musical meets Mean Girls, though. The main teenage female lead looks like Idina Menzel and comes off achingly insecure, one of the supporting guys made me think he was a trap for like the entire pilot and for some reason they've got the butch chick from 40-Year-Old Virgin and Role Models playing... the exact role she always plays in every movie.

Honestly, it wasn't terribly compelling but I might just stick around for Jayma Mays and the hopes that her character will eventually hook up with Link Lark-- I mean Matthew Morrison. Even though his character is married. With a baby on the way. but TBH they don't exactly make his wife look all that endearing. It's interesting to see Mays playing a character I don't hate, too.

I don't know... this show hits an odd spot with me. I love the musicals that I have seen (which have been quite a few) and used to be a drama kid (for the short time I was in high school), so it's weird to see a show about it. Especially when the 'club' itself is so... awkward. We never had much in the way of disabilities and minorities and the rest of school didn't really look down on us for existing. What is with that stereotype in American media, anyway? I never noticed that kind of stigma. Maybe in the bias between people who would come to basketball games over performances, but that's hardly something worth stuffing a kid in a port-a-potty over. Which, in TV and movies, is apparently always the case.

... I dunno, maybe the kids over here are too stoned to seriously bully anyone. But I digress.

On that note, though-- why the hell were people throwing tomato juice at Elphaba Jr.'s face? Okay, I get that she's mildly obnoxious and has two gay fathers, but she's hardly Hollywood Homely enough to undergo that brand of two-dimensional high school torment. I kept getting flashbacks to the goddamn Weather Man. Not to mention the fact that she was arguably prettier than the main cheerleader antagonist... this is just so unevenly casted, IMO.


TL;DR: Glee doesn't fill me with much glee, but then again it's almost 1 here and I only have an episode to go off of. Hopefully it grows into itself, but when reviewers are saying said butch chick from above is the best part of the show so far...

TODAY'S REVIEW:



I think it's hard to hear lyrics in huge theatres like the Paramount, when all of your songs are wordy... As is the case with Flight of the Conchords. They were going for more of an actual concert approach than stand-up at times, which was cool and bad at the same time. Cool because you really heard more of the music, bad because... well, like I said, the lyrics are a huge part of it, these guys being more of a comedy duo, and missing them really takes from the experience.

I mean, I got most of the lyrics anyway-- but that's because I know the songs. Sometimes it's hard for me to enjoy a concert or musical if the people I'm with aren't constantly enjoying it like I am, as well. I seemed to spend more time making sure they were enjoying themselves and getting the jokes than I was watching the band. Which is dumb, I know. I should've stared at them the whole time, dad and soon-to-be-stepmother be damned.

The set list was, well. Interesting. They tried to pass it off as if they weren't really sure what they were going to do next, but of course-- having the power of the internet-- I know otherwise. There must've been at least a vague guideline; most of their stuff came from the second season, songs like Too Many Dicks on the Dancefloor (which they opened up with, having Arj Barker on this part of the tour), Hurt Feelings, Demon Woman, Epileptic Dogs, I Told You I Was Freaky...

I never realized just how weird these song titles are out of context.

.. ANYWAY. They did play two songs from their HBO special -- Jenny and Business Time? Which was at least good for the old folks, because you could really hear the lyrics. Then there was the Bus Driver's Song, which I'd heard of (it being an older track) but hadn't actually heard. I imagine it's pretty good lyrically, but I didn't catch most of it... though they did manage to base an entire season 2 episode on it, so I think I got the gist. I was mostly lost on their new song, Stana. Kind of an Old West-themed deal, The Devil Went Down To Georgia-esque. For the record, it ends on a very awkward, incestuous note.

And at some point the guys broke out into Free Bird, which apparently has a funny story behind it. "I've always wondered - is there one person in every town whose job it is to yell 'Free Bird'?" "Or is it the same guy, following us around?"

I always feel rather... 'amorous' after concerts, too. I'm not sure if this is just an eventfetish-related thing or an 'all of the people you watch are very, very attractive to you' thing. Could be both. It doesn't help that they went from In Love With The Same Girl at the end and somehow segued into an acoustic version of Sugalumps. Let me repeat that emphasized for you, though, in case you didn't catch it the first time: An acoustic version of Sugalumps, or this song. Yeah, that was fun. And embarrassing. And I think one of the fangirls in the front row was just crazy enough to cop a feel. (Of course, given all the hip-thrusting it wasn't exactly hard to. No pun intended.)

Y'know what was really nice, though? The banter. It seems like they'd be a ton of fun to hang out with, or maybe see performing in a cafe. I'm betting they really do make at least that part up on the spot, too. ♥


TL;DR: New Zealand's 'fourth most popular guitar-based digi-bongo acappella-rap-funk-comedy folk duo' isn't exactly godly when live, but it was definitely worth a three hour trip through overpriced, resold tickets in the mezzanine section to Seattle for. Then again, I wasn't the one paying.

TODAY'S REVIEW:



Whuddleworld starts out with promise. Your basic kid-friendly site; a bit like Neopets, only yet to go down the Neopets' "Let's advertise the fuck out of our target audience" route. Which I'm thankful for, don't get me wrong-- as much as I love using choice words, there's something to be said about G-rated material. It's a throwback to simpler times.

... At least, it should be.

Upon joining, you're confronted with an avatar-based system, anthro-style pixel art. Cute enough, right? The selection is limited, but as is with any virtual pet site, you have to work to really get anything. I guess that's teaching our kids the right values! Work hard and people will respect you, work hard and you can dress up properly... Again, simple stuff.

I think I wouldn't have even bothered attempting to review it were it not for a glaringly huge mistake in the site's composition: Mainly, the Orientation Quiz.

Ohhh, the orientation quiz. Depending on your age selection (12 and under to 13 and above), you're required to take a bit of a test to rank your 'citizenship' level, which in turn determines what you can and cannot access on the site. This should be fairly general stuff, but it's only when you click to take it that it's actually composed of about 12 small quizzes acting as a tutorial for the site's features and terms of service. This would not be a problem, honestly, if I hadn't been given a goddamn tutorial at the beginning in slideshow form. You would think one could grasp the basics well enough with that, which was, believe me, longer than necessary, but no.

And it's not like these quizzes are all based on simple, 'Food Handler's Permit' levels of thinking. When they call it a quiz they are not fucking with you-- this is a test. A comprehensive one at that. And if you screw up on a single question, you have to take the whole portion over again. No clues as to what you said wrong, and some of these things are so vague or minor that you have to wonder if it's even worth the trouble. Hell, at one point I was asked where a goddamn pixel grill was located in town and by then it was obvious they were just trying to fuck with me.

Isn't this supposed to be a kid's game? I mean, sure, I picked the '13 and over' section, but I'm not sure I can give a lot of teenagers enough credit as to being able to answer all these on the first try. And according to yahoo answers, I'm not the only one who had to struggle through this section! I joined this site to dress up cute little lion people, nothing more. I'm pretty sure this is one of those sites your typical teenager would want to use as a distraction from their education, as well, not an extension of it.

I get wanting to weed through any possible morons out there-- I would want an application process for that kind of thing too. I'm just saying, it's a bit much and could possibly turn a lot of kids (and their parents) off. I suppose it's not a huge loss, though; you could get all the fun of dressing up cute things on eLouai for free and with not even half the effort required.


TL;DR: If you want to draw kids in, keep the tutorials out. Or at least make them less wordy. (And when this is coming from me, of all people, you know you've got problems.)

I love these guys.

The latest Koukou Debut is sweet. Kind of.

I think I just hate Asami and want her to go die in a fire. Along with her brother complex.

IN OTHER NEWS: THANKS LIVEJOURNAL FOR EDUCATING ME ON THE PROPER USAGE OF THE WORD 'VAGINA DENTATA'

SERIOUSLY

The closest thing to toothed pelvic areas I've come across is Yahtzee's review of an Anne Rice novel.

Y'know, sometimes I forget I'm a gamer in a world that doesn't quite understand the concept.

And sometimes I forget I'm watching the blog of a mother. A rather unorthodox one half the time (and it is her personal blog) but... yeah.

http://thebloggess.com/?p=704

I just love how she actually commented on one of my (LJ) entries before. Totally random.

I miss Steve.

Very, very much.

_{I bet the reason he could never find a clue was because he was too busy looking around a green screen.}

So... if instead of going to Shiz, everybody was just drafted and genderbent, you'd basically have Son of a Witch.

The parallels here are ... well, it's a still a continuation, but you can't tell me Liir and Trism aren't just Elphie and Glinda reincarnate as guys. But I guess that's intentional, huh. At least those two managed to seal the deal before their final goodbye -- Which, speaking of, if wikipedia hadn't spoiled me and been all "BY THE WAY, THEY'RE LOVERS", I probably wouldn't have seen it coming... Nor would I have honestly picked the damn thing up again.
I-- I'm not even a yaoi fangirl, either. And yet, this was the one time I was inspired enough to draw two men together. WHAT HAVE I BECOME? AND WHY DOES LIIR LOOK VAGUELY LIKE A VAMPIRIC LEE PACE?

I'm just hesitating to finish the book now, really. I know Liir's baby mama's said baby is born green, so his maternity is no longer up for questioning. Not that it was in the first place, really; but apparently wikipedia doesn't acknowledge things like that without the phrasing 'heavily implied'. As for the fate of my new favorite gay pairing in Oz, I'm guessing things don't pan out well. When Macguire uses the word 'final' he typically means it. Really, I'm lucky if both of them are at least alive by the end of the book.

And that really, really sucks.

WHY MUST YOU SINK ALL THE GOOD SHIPS, MACGUIRE. For that matter, why the hell should I be reading A Lion Among Men if it features neither Elphaba or Liir but a friggin' Lion? Okay, maybe it's not so bad but I just know I'm going to be dragging myself through the whole novel. Especially if there's a lack of romantic subplot.

...and one more thing, this writing style confuses me to the point of needing a visible dunce cap. I had to read Wicked at least three times to really get what was going on, and what I want to get in this installment I have to look up in a dictionary. Hell, I didn't even know these guys were going at it until I really analyzed the paragraph. That's right, it was all implied. In a paragraph. I'll admit I should've used deductive reasoning here (because, uh, if they weren't sleeping in the first half...), but still. Good christ.

Despite their exhaustion, they hardly slept. They clung to each other, making the least possible noise, and when it got too much to bear they buried their faces in pillows. Spent, at least briefly, they dozed, and Liir's last thought was: sleeping with the talent. A dragon mesmerist, of all things -- what magic a body is -- all that you couldn't know about the world packed up tightly in the flesh lying on your breast.

All the things Ansonby and Burny had known about -- not about girls, but about people -- how they felt when they were closer than clothes could ever be. How secret, still: How still, and secret. But a connection nonetheless, dared and decided: a new way of knowing, new burning letters falling through the air -- and the words that could be spelled weren't all disastrous.