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running through the night
2003-11-10 12:16:57
I'm not sure how to judge the productivity of this weekend. Sure, I survived Con Ja Nai, despite almost setting a new record for hours in continuous heavy operation (20.5, falling just a little short of the 22 I logged this time last year taking the GRE), and I didn't pull too many muscles lifting stuff, but I didn't get any work done, and I would seriously have killed myself if I had had to watch another episode of Divergence Eve.
So many con memories, so little restraint as it got later and later.....here's some highlights:
Bertha: Dear Boys was really confusing. It's an anime with pretty boys, and they're not gay! What's going on here?
Temperance: No, I didn't mean that. There are some, reactions, that dead bodies just don't do.
Suleman: Putting a razor-edged umbrella up someone's ass and then opening it, now that would be a painful way to die.
Julius: In episode 6 a girl rapes another girl and they show almost everything.
Johnson: This guy was, like, "I like cheese", and I'm like, "Yeah, but I don't like your buddy handling the DVDs there." Do they actually think they can get away with that?
Pizza Chris: It says free, so can I leave?
Car Chris: We have another problem in Aud 4 again.
Ian: We should take the metal poles from the cart and give them to staffers in case someone takes a sword out inside.
Kalium: I can't give five bucks to the Donut, I spent all my money on Witch Hunter Robin.
Leanna: During Lesson XX I was laughing even when it wasn't supposed to be funny. "Oh, he's on a bike. Ha ha ha ha."
Me: Pimp never *shows* anything less than a fifty.
Elliot: I wasn't raffled, I was just thrown to the audience.
Yeah. We raffled off our secretary....or we tried to. Ian was about to draw the ticket when Suleman pushed Elliot off the stage, where he was promptly abducted by this girl who had been stalking him earlier. We eventually got him back, with most of his original parts still in place.
Anyhow, nobody died, we made about 75% of our costs (and a bunch of that will be amortized over the remaining T-shirts, so it's not a problem), the attendees had a good time, and there was plenty of food for staff. Ian says success, and even though he didn't have a nearly-irreplaceable S-deck almost break on his watch or have to sit through 50 minutes of cantelopes-taped-to-a-baseball-bat pandering, I'm inclined to concur.
Then yesterday I wrote about two and a half pages of DSV, and almost did some video work, but instead ginned up two tracks in Acid. If there's a techno music producers' union, they should file suit against Sonic Foundry for making software that stands to put them out of a job. Acid makes it almost too easy to do this stuff, even if you have little talent for or interest in techno, as I do. Schoolwork is going okay, but I've got a bunch of stuff to write, and a meeting really late; should probably print off the lecture abstract and go do that.
--Kai out
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torture the reason we fought
2003-11-07 18:43:29
Con Ja Nai X staffer checklist:
sleep? check.
nutrition down? check.
tapes? check.
digi-media? check.
fillers? check.
cables? check.
labeling tape? check.
stimulants? check.
alcohol? check.
sanity? nosir.
SET TO FUCKEN GO.
The playbill isn't quite done yet. Two rooms didn't have audio gear until last night. We just lost a staffer and a half. And our space is nearly triple-booked between us, Japanese filmmakers, and the state high school debate tournament. Fun fun fun. If you love cons to death and can never understand why so many of the senior staff look like they're about to kill themselves, come on into the green room and try pulling this gig yourself.
And, as the name implies, this isn't even quite a con. We've got a cosplay contest, a couple vendors, and showings out the ass, but there's no panels, there's no gaming, there's no karaoke, and there's no AMV contest.
The last of which is a particular blessing, because *I* would probably be the one running that. And if I had to fuck around with outputting people's entries, drawing up a ballot, and squeezing some prizes out of the raffle box, on top of all my school and personal issues, it's pretty damn certain that one of my housemates would find me on my floor with my sword in my gut and a poem like this taped to the door:
"Like a squirrel on I-23
This world will show no pity.
Why must Linkinballers be asshats?"
Or if somebody in the area submitted something really egregious, I'd just go out and kill *them*.
Meg seems to be doing better, which is good. I wish it didn't have to be this way, but it's my fault that it does, so I'm not really in a position to say anything.
Rrg. Discs to check, schedules to line up, a pack to load, and I really ought to get some sleep. And try not reaching for the sake right when I wake up.
--Kai out
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corruption as they
2003-11-06 15:20:50
Rob and Farlo seem to like it, so as soon as I get off my butt and get together title info, it is likely that #30 will appear from Globocide. It's great that people are implementing a deliberately anti-mainstream AMV locale; hopefully, the long-hoped-for Anime Metal Video Alliance has taken another step towards reality.
Meg seems to be doing better, but I still need to talk to her directly. On the mend? At the end? Only time can tell.
School Project Hell continues without letup: Con Ja Nai day after tomorrow, PS5 due Tuesday, 492 exam Wednesday, PA3 due Thursday. No turning back. Going to school is about physically and mentally intense 18-hour days; if I wanted to sleep, I would have gone into German. I've got to figure out what I'll be able to do while I'm not running/watching equipment for CJN.
I'm nearing the end of my rope, but I'll be doing the slack meal tonight, since tonight is also an output night; I might get some extra sleep and eat a nutritious dinner tomorrow instead of going to CJS.
If I can just get through THIS NEXT ASSIGNMENT, I'll be able to work on the video again. Unfortunately, when the schedule calls for me to work myself to death tomorrow in order to sleep all day Sunday, there's not a lot of space or time to cut clips in VDub.
SUCK.
--Kai out
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the wind whispered goodbye
2003-11-05 13:49:07
Yesterday was unnaturally warm. Today snapped straight back to the normal November cold, and I wouldn't be surprised if we got some snow before the con.
The summer's over. The sun is dying, and soon enough we'll be at the heart of winter.
I've never been real real good at dealing with loss. Too many people you know dying over too quick a span of time does that. I feel like I should be crying, but the tears just don't come. If push comes to shove, I'm sure that I have enough alcohol money, tragic anime, and Type O Negative to artificially induce catharsis, but....if I can keep minimally functioning, if I can now give my normal 60% because I'm struggling hard against a limiter instead of just churning along as normal, I won't feel I *NEED* to. Getting too good at suppressing emotions just means that more must be suppressed longer.
It sucks.
Work is, however, going great guns. I did substantial revision of all my 481 stuff last night, and the tightening that we have to do tonight won't bee too difficult. I'm well on top of the output I need to do by CJN. Brian and I whipped through maybe half of the 478 programming assignment in an hour or so today; we'll hopefully knock it the rest of the way down tomorrow. This is important because I'm doing lead-programmer this time around, after Brian writing 80+ percent of the code on the last two projects. And, last but not least, I have a chapter map, purpose statement, outline, and main character sketch file for Bugles all done. If I can push hard in this National Novel-Writing Month, I may actually start seriously working on Bugles by the end of the spring.
Of course, videos, school, and working things out with Meg (in order of importance) will tend to interrupt, but that's reasonable. I'm not a professional writer yet. I'm a professional student with a relationship in limbo and a time-devouring hobby. The book is not my top priority.
Even so, there's something to be said for the ethic of Just Writing. It took me about two years to get the first four chapters of DSV finished. Writing the next seven has taken me less than seven months. Even on four hours a week, it's possible to produce a novel-length work in a year. Especially if *I* can do it. People who have actually taken writing classes and know what they're about could probably run circles around those production figures.
--Kai out
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release your blood | fade away
2003-11-04 19:28:23
It was another pea-soup fog day this morning, one I wished I'd gotten up earlier into. And the Gash Bell render finished early as well. Later, the sun burned through and pushed tempreatures into the seventies, making me sweat like my leather army coat was made out of lead as I walked home.
I should have known this day would go wrong. It had odd omens written all over it.
Around 5:45 tonight, Meg sort of broke up with me, or at least announced that she was tired of this staying-true-to-someone-hopelessly-far-away gig. Not fun. I'm sorry that there's nothing I can do for her, nothing I can do to help her, but I made this ridiculously uncomfortable bed and now I have to lie in it.
At the least, I'll be going into overdrive when I really need to. A con this weekend, a major project due two days from now, and two major assignments due two days after the con. If I sit around and don't do my work, I'll just get stupid-depressed; better to work myself into the ground and actually get all my stuff done.
I know denial's not healthy, but I don't have the time to really get my issues out of my system. All I can do is turn up the death metal and forge ahead.
It was a fun six months. And I've watched too much Marmalade Boy to rule out the possibility that we'll get back together. Dakara: no regrets. Not now, not ever.
--Kai out
JOURNAL: Kai Stromler (Kai Stromler)
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