Braving Alaska

I finally worked up the courage to read Looking For Alaska. 

Oh God.

I read the first forty pages silently to myself, and then I read everything but the last forty pages aloud to Matt, Alex and Mads. I think the reading aloud gave me something to focus on and kept me from becoming a sad puddle, but it was still rough in a few places. It was fantastic. So good. In a different way than The Fault in Our Stars, which I read last year; that one was like getting stabbed in the gut repeatedly, while this felt like slowly starving to death. So, different kinds of pain. But so good.

Also, I kept picturing Alaska with the same haircut as my friend Amelia, longer in the front and pretty short in the back, because the two of them are remarkably similar in personality and mannerisms and also because Pudge talks more about Alaska's curves than anything else. I think it's more than halfway through the book before we find out what her hair color is. Teenage boys, whaddaya gonna do.

So that was a struggle, but I really enjoyed it and will certainly read it again (once I've had some time to recover.) I don't think I can read another book for a while. This one still hurts.

Meanwhile, I've been spending my weekends barricaded in the art building. This weekend I'm making a tree stump fairy house out of cardboard and zip ties. The plan is to put a live video camera in the bottom, so when you crouch down and peer in the front door, your eye is projected up to a monitor in the upper half of the stump, so whoever looks at the monitor sees what the fairy would see if she was looking out of her house.

Cheers all. Read Alaska. She's worth the emotional trauma, I promise.

Commander Kip
"It's my fox hat."

Normal is overrated!

THIS IS ART

Today my Expanded Media class is spending six hours (9am to 3pm) on four-foot-by-four-foot pallets. We're allowed to do whatever we want, but it has to be the SAME activity for all six of the hours. I'm working on Birthright, which feels good. I furnished my pallet for long-term comfort:

 

Some of the other crazy activities going on. My professor is cutting a pair of coveralls off of himself and stapling them down to his pallet.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=295791717212688&set=vb.270541553071038&type=2&theater

This is such the best. I'm so glad I'm in this class.

Loving my life right now.

Commander Kip
"A... meat... dagger."
Normal is overrated!

winter in the Surlinds

We haven't really planned out the seasons in the Surlinds at all, but it is certainly feasible that the nuclear destruction of the Mer could have an effect on the weather. Actually, I just wanted an excuse to draw Suvoi in the snow.

 

The loose panels on Suvoi’s copperwain clattered in the sharp wind. Clumps of snow mixed with grey ash whirled around Suvoi as she perched on the high driver’s bench, squinting into the unfamiliar white world. Her unbound hair tore about her head like a lick of dark flame. Weather’s all knackered. Snow in the Grey – there’s something I’ve never seen. Huiva, clinging to the low back of the bench, looked positively grouchy, the feathers around his neck and shoulders fluffed up against the cold. Suvoi felt much the same, tucking her chin deep into the thick scarf swaddling her neck. Neither of them had ever liked the cold, and now their home was a frozen wasteland instead of just a wasteland.

The front end of the wagon lurched down, throwing Suvoi forward almost off the bench. She threw the brake lever, gripping the long handle with numb fingers for balance as the wagon shuddered and teetered to a stop. Swinging down from the bench, Suvoi landed with a crunch in a mess of ashy snow that had melted and refrozen multiple times. The copperwain had tipped over the edge of a sudden but shallow slope. Suvoi held her hat onto her head and narrowed her eyes, trying to determine how far the slope went. It grew gradually steeper before disappearing into the whorls of snow. Ice stung Suvoi’s cheeks and brow; she could feel her eyelashes stiffening with it. This is the blast crater, she realized. The outermost edge of it, anyway. Stretching into my Grey. Those bastards.

She began picking her way down the slope, her boots punching through the crust of ice, dust, and ash, leaving her copperwain half-lodged in the raised lip of the crater. She didn’t call Huiva. He wouldn’t go anywhere near the Silver Forest. 

So yeah, no one has talked about developing that part of the story, but that doesn't mean I can't play around a bit outside of canon, right?

New Sherlock up online!! *freaking out*

Commander Kip
"Why are you being so nice to me?" "I can be nice. Sometimes."
Normal is overrated!

Round 21: FIGHT

My apologies, normally you would get a Christmas post, a birthday post, AND a New Years post, but I skipped the birthday one this year. You guys, I am so done with this bloody sinus infection. It just keeps rearing its ugly, snotty head. I completely lost my voice on my birthday, and today the fever came back and I slept through most of our family New Years gathering. I've been taking all kinds of herbs and enzymes and probiotics and I still can't kick it. The hell is the matter with my immune system? Seriously.

So yeah, I did in fact turn 21. Egad. And my resolution is never to drink, not even once. I just don't wanna. Can't make me. Did go to the antique mall with my grandma, and found a few cool things. Watched Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World with Brenticus last night. Want Ramona's hair.

Also, Brennie got me Mass Effect 2 for Christmas, and it is such the fun. I can't get enough of Garrus. Not sure how they managed to make a battle-scarred alien with mandibles attractive, but they did it somehow and I just want to give him a big hug. And maybe have his human/turian hybrid babies. What.

I did draw things this semester, I promise, and before I got really sick I scanned some things. Here, have a new character in honor of the new year.

Remember the hippie chick I drew for fun a while ago, intending on making her into a character eventually? I did it. This is Razma, a nomadic fire dancer from Magical Steampunk Gypsies.

An early design. For the Invartí (traveling dance troupes)of the Grey, I wanted a sort of post-apocalyptic earthy look; ragged, billowy clothes, sturdy boots for walking, and lots of fun shiny bits.

Did some more playing around with her and decided to give her white hair.

And then I decided to just go all the way and make her albino. She is known as the White Rose to other Romonians, which is ironic considering that she has a lotus tattooed on her shoulder. The rest of the arsura, or fire dancers, worship the sun god Solon, but Razma identifies more closely with Selen, the moon goddess. Self-conscious of her colorless eyebrows and lashes, she darkens them with kohl.

Razma dances with flaming poi, which can also be used as weapons if necessary, though Invartí are generally expected to be peaceful.

And then I had the urge to draw her in a thick cozy scarf. Because it was cold in Minnesota at the time and I couldn't help it.

So that's Razma. Her mother left their troupe, the Sovrana, when Razma was young, intent on making it through the twisted and evil land that was once the Silver Forest to the alleged paradise on the other side. When she left, she took the sacred fire of the arsura with her. Razma grew up ostricized for her mother's betrayal, mastering the poi and formulating a desire to follow her mother's path. She's sullen and withdrawn, but very good at her craft.

I have more stuff for you, but I should prolly sleep first. I have not gotten nearly enough things done on this break, largely because I have not spent much time out of my bed. I have got to kick this infection before I go back to school, or interim is going to suck.

I did, however, read both House of Hades and Clockwork Princess while bedridden. Both quite enjoyable. I liked Nico as a character before, but House of Hades made me really seriously love him. He just needs so many hugs. And a cute boyfriend. Meanwhile, all of the angsty problems in Clockwork Princess could have been solved by two words: hot threesome.

Also, Misfits continues to be delectably sordid. I will never not want to see Simon and Alisha being gorgeous together. My god, why are they so pretty?

Kay. Bed now. Maybe less snot tomorrow? Here's hoping.

Commander Kip
"You can't kill me, I'm lactose intolerant!"
Normal is overrated!