Had quite a weekend! Had a fab weekend which includes having my ankle sprained and lots of talks with friends and lazing around at Dell's house. Ely was there till Saturday, but Peloy and me stayed till Sunday just so we could be Dell's convenient excuse. But, hey, it was good to stay and besides I couldn't walk that well yet (cos of the said ankle). Got to meet interesting peepol too. hahaha

Being in Windangers Anonymous is actually getting to be a good kind of therapy, I think. Or maybe I mean a good kind of escape. But it's good for my mental health, so tha's that.

I mean, I don't wanna see my brother at all. My mom kinda laughed when I complained in 3 text messages, but they said they understood me. So there. Maybe I'm not so paranoid after all, thinking that my brother's demands are actually reasonable and is part of my duty as a sister.

this seems to fit here...


Gray:
You poor, depressed child. A rain cloud seems to
follow you everywhere. The worst has always got
to happen doesn't it? Life is miserable.


What color do you see the world in?
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I have no other wish than to sit in a corner and hide then maybe figure out what I'm doing with my life at the same time.



YOU ARE LENORE!! yay...


Which lenore character are you?
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Read this old interview of The Comics Journal of Art Spiegelman. (from Peloy's book The New Comics) This is not thesis-related at all. Then again I haven't been thinking "thesis" for some time now.

JOURNAL: Why was RAW#1 "The Graphix Magazine of Postponed Suicides"? A postponed suicide is just a stall till suicide,isn't it? That doesn't sound very hopeful at all...
SPIEGELMAN: Let me answer that with a quote from NIetzsche: "The thought of suicide is a great consolation: with the help of it one has got through many a bad night." To think about suicide isn't necessarily to commit suicide. it's to acknowledge the possibility and to acknowledge the precariousness of being alive and to affirm it. Every moment that you don't commit suicide is an affirmation. It's deciding to live some more. The reason I think it's actually an optimistic notion is the fact that...well, that quote that's in the inside front cover by Cioran, "A book is a postponed suicide," to me implies an act of faith has been committed. Which is, to create a work of art, a book, a painting, a poem, a magazine, a comics strip, whatever and that the work is in itself a justification for remaining alive. In that sense, at least, I felt I was provisionally optimistic.


I guess that entire quote is more of a mood thing.

Met with my bro, got to wash his clothes, got P500 for my trouble. Well, it didn't exactly happen like that, but that's the gist of it. No scary offers yet of living with him, thank badness.

something's a wee bit wrong with my blog template.I've done tried to update all the links and shit but it remains the same. What could be wrong?

sigh.

Desperately seeking for space, flitting from place to place...

seems like more people are coming in than I can handle.actually it's just one person who I have issues with...my brother (read: big elder brother). received a text message from him this morning saying hes been promoted and he'll be staying here in manila starting feb.15.

guess i should be happy or something. guess it would be ok if everything was great between me and my family.

it will be so hard to hide things now. and i just mean the CL thing for starters. 0_0 sheesh. let's just hope he'll be too busy to bother about my life.

he was the only one who ever asked me the question: what do you plan to do after you graduate? ugh. yech. i remember the horrors of that day and how i evaded answering that life-threatening question sucessfully enough cos I'm still here and that was almost 4years ago, i think.

anyway, i just friggin' hope he won't ask me to live with him.

he's thinking of asking my aunt if he can stay here in cavite temporarily. oh joy. there goes one of my quiet places to do thesis.

wow...this news gets me blogging again.

sigh. SIGH SIGH.

What Lord of the Rings Male and Mood Do You Desire?
brought to you by Quizilla

hahahaha...true true true hahahahahaha

I'm back. Brain still on vacation, sadly.

Still in cavite...might try to blog longer when I'm more sane.Blog about my vacation or move my blog to another host.whatever.fix things up.do thesis.tons of stuff.

Spending Christmas in Iloilo with relatives.

Another thesis thing!

MINORITY REPORT: A BRIEF HISTORY OF WOMEN IN COMICS, PART 1
By Rob Vollmar
Continuing his series of essays on minority voices, Rob Vollmar
traces the presence of female creators and the market for girl's
comics through the 1940s, 50s and 60s, to see how economics and
censorship helped drive both close to extinction.







find your poetry style
this quiz was made by mamaslyth

An interesting excerpt from another article in 9thart. About monologues in comics though the entire article talks of other things too.(by Antony Johnston)

So I finished the script for ALAN MOORE'S THE COURTYARD a few weeks ago. If you've been living under a rock, allow me to briefly explain; THE COURTYARD is a short prose story by Moore, written for an HP Lovecraft tribute anthology a few years back. I've adapted it into comic form for Avatar Press, and Jacen Burrows is drawing it.

Now, this was somewhat of a daunting task. Moore is probably the best-known and most-admired comic writer of our times, and here am I - a little-known writer of some small promise - producing a comic script which has to meet the man's standards.

I've written prose myself, of course. And I know damn well that when I write, I have a pretty clear mental image of what I want to get over. Given his 'normal' medium, I think it's safe to assume Moore does, too.

The problem is: you may have a clear image in your head, but (because this is prose) you don't always write it into the text. Not unless you're Thomas Hardy, anyway.

And this made me realise something I'd never really thought about before. One of the differences between prose and comics which now seems so obvious, I can hardly believe I didn't think of it when I agreed to script THE COURTYARD:

In prose, it's perfectly acceptable to write long segments of story where nothing actually happens. I don't mean blank pages, of course; I'm talking about those parts of the story where you're inside a character's head, reading an inner monologue. And if that inner monologue's important to the story, then it has to go into an adaptation.

Comics aren't very good at having nothing happen. Even 'talking heads' scenes can be made to work; viewpoints can be shifted, different characters can be drawn, and the fact that it's a conversation between two or more people makes it more visual right off the bat.

Not so with a monologue. It's a bit of a challenge.

Instead, you have to come up with something new; something either the character is doing, or something you can show while the monologue is going on; a juxtaposition perhaps. Essentially, you have to Make Something Up.

Making Something Up is not normally a problem for me. It shouldn't be a problem for any writer. But this is Making Something Up For Alan Moore, for heaven's sake. A somewhat different proposition to making something up for my own stories.

I'll say one thing; it's opened my eyes to how artists must feel when they get a bare-bones script, and have to fill in visual details that aren't in the text. I swear I'll never write a one-line panel description again...

------------------------------------------------

Using blog for thesis shit.clearing up my inbox and noting down stuff that I have to read.

EDITORIAL: CAMERA OBSCURA - SUPERHATE
By Alasdair Watson
Stand back, Superman. There's just one thing dominating Alasdair
Watson's thoughts this month: His consuming hatred for that sexless,
simplistic, immoral and inferior icon of a sci-fi subgenre: the
superhero.

EDITORIAL: FACE IT, TIGERBy Andrew Wheeler
Andrew Wheeler completes the trio of new look 9A editorials with a
look at the world of continental comics, the scorecard on
homosexuality and representation, and news of, well, the news at
Ninth Art.

THE FRIDAY REVIEW: THE INVISIBLES: SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTIONBy Brent Keane
As the final volume of Grant Morrison's unruly epic hits stores,
Ninth Art goes back to the lighting of the fuse with the very first
volume. It's the perfect place to join the Invisibles. If, y'know,
you're into that whole 'linear' thing.

GUEST EDITORIAL: LOST IN THE WAR ZONEBy Jamie Delano
In the first of Ninth Art's new guest editorials, the original
HELLBLAZER writer and the man behind OUTLAW NATION offers us
his "confessions of a minor writer fallen out of love with The Word".

EVERYBODY BE COOL: THE DRESS UP LONGBOXBy Kieron Gillen
There's more to the iconic power of comics than Superman. Comics are
a great resource for iconic images; yet only in rare cases does
the 'look' make the crossover into fashion.

waaah...I bloggy lost quite a long entry that I made while I was in Cavite 0_0 It wasn't published, it wasn't even posted.
I forgot what I said there.something about time passing and me rambling abou stuff in general.The usual crap.BUt that's no excuse for it tobe losty-mclosty.

sigh.

Bengki is in Dasmariñas,Cavite for the entire week and then some. Dell is in Bacoor, Cavite. Stef is in Australia? Da has started working in an Ad company in Makati. Ely will start work on Friday in Makati writing job descriptions. Trish is in the US, MM's in Iloilo...oh where are you April...I kinda feel alone O_O

There I just had to say all that. I feel as if I'm in some kind of impasse (is that even the right word? I don't care anymore). I'm hoping everyone will be free on the 31st so we can have long delayed comics script workshop. Strangely (or aptly), it would be a Halloweeen workshop of some sorts. Bengki said something about coming in costumes. Ely said somethng about making those fancy Halloween treats. What I say is that people just show up and that would be enough though they pobably need those enticements that Bengki and Ely mentioned. -_- oh well.

A quiz to make me feel all better... yeah right.


What colour of Skittle are you?

But really...I'm happy that Dell is now having time for himself and Ely and Da have jobs and all the rest of it... but I can whine right? =)

Here's our favorite drinking trio discussin comics again!

TRIPLE A: STAND UP COMICS By Wheeler, Watson and Johnston
Is there anything that comics can do that other media can't? And if
any such devices exist, are they gimmicks or useful tools? This month
Ninth Art's roundtable discussion addresses the question: What's so
special about telling tales in comic form?

So when is GRAIL gonna have it's own version?

These days I don't feel like blogging. Must be because I got tons of stuff to read and that comics script for the GRAIL folio to finish writing. Darn. Deadline's this week but looks like nobody else is submitting other than the usual people. Maybe I should be glad that people will be submitting something this time. Count GRAIL's blessings or some shit like that o_O

I dunno if anyone would be interested but here's a page on What Tolkien Officially Said About Elf Sex
It's quite long and uhh...scholarly. I haven't finished looking through it either.


Which Celtic Moon Sign Fits Your Personality Best?
brought to you by Quizilla

find out which origami you are

-------------------------

Got some articles from April Yap on comics today and I've been looking through them to see what I could use. Of course, there would be stuff that would pique our interest and others that well...I wouldn't waste money on to be copied for my personal use, to put it mildly.

Looking at all those materials reminded me why I've stopped looking in old magazines and journals in the library in the first place. Why?
Because most local articles just tend to repeat themselves. It's as if they all have one ultimate source of information for their articles and they have nothing new to add. And I think I know which article is The Source.
There's also the occasional comics-as-corruptor-of-the-nation's-youth-type of article.
And then there are a number of inane gush-o-ramas.

Of course there are exceptions, but generally...

This is my pet peeve for today.

In Edwin Sallan's Fan Boy column in the Manila Times dated 3 March 1995, he says: "Comic book fans nowadays are commonly referred to as Fan Boys, thus this column's title. I know, I know. The term is not exactly gender sensitive but then again, a large percentage of comic collectors are male. Oh well, female comic collectors can always call themselves Fan Girls."

In the same column in which the topic is Comics Collection 101, he gives examples of titles which for him constitute a good read and he divides them into the following uh..genres(?):
HUMOR: Archie series, The Simpsons, etc.
VIGILANTE SUPERHEROES: Batman, The Punisher, Spiderman
SUPERPOWERED HEROES: Superman, Green Lantern, Flash, Wonder Woman
TEAM HEROES: X-Men, Wild C.A.T.S., Justice League
TEENAGE SUPERHEROES: Legion of Superheroes, Gen13, GenerationX
HEROES ON THE EDGE: Lobo, Wolverine, Incredible Hulk, Spawn


We got a long way to go.

Which Famous Homosexual are you?

I really don't think being Eleanor Roosevelt is cool, but she's actually gay?
And here's what the entire description actually said about her. Sounds quite interesting. I wonder if Emily Dickinson is in the quiz.

Eleanor Roosevelt! Nice to see you.

A Roosevelt yourself, you married your fifth cousin Franklin; despite the obvious incestuous overtones, your six kids were happy and healthy.

When Franklin got elected, you became perhaps the most controversial first lady ever - you spoke out for the rights of women; for the rights of the poor; for world peace. You were even a member of a union while your husband was in office - and when he died, you were the head of the UN Commission on Human Rights.

All of which is pretty kick ass, but to top things off you had a hot and steamy relationship with the lesbian journalist Lorena Hickok, who was so madly in love with you that she halted her career for you. Unfortunately, you couldn't give up your public life that easily - leaving her heartbroken.

Bitch.

pwede na....you think?

On another note, COMM3 is finally over! Did the speech thing last Monday and now it's done. Our grades were actually available by Thursday, but I forgot to check it out.
I was able to borrow a book from April Yap called Comics & Culture.Yay! Thesis shit. It's nice feeling that I can get more sources now. Almost enough to lift me out of current thesis crisis mode. =(

Here's something that might help us write those darned scripts. (Or maybe it won't help) Click to read more.

CAMERA OBSCURA: ARE YOU EXPERIENCED?By Alasdair Watson
When it comes to engaging the audience, comics have a power to connect in tremendously complex ways. Alasdair Watson attempts to unravel the riddle of comics' great potential for communication.

on another note, I'm getting porn spam. why? This was the subject of the last one: "I cannot believe a 18 year old girl can handle a Giant horse Cock?" ewww.

I'd like to end my entry with this enlightening info.

My insulting name is Zebra bastard zebra zebra zebra zebra fucker Brachiosaur!
What's yours?

Here's the new look of my blog with still the same ol' colors. I'm too lazy to think of a new color scheme and I'm not tired of the old one yet. Updated the links too so Ely is there now and Neil Gaiman's and Warren Ellis' and even Budj's blog. =)

Quite an interesting article here. Check it out.
TRIPLE A: BRING ME A DREAM By Wheeler, Johnston and Watson
Five years after the publication of SANDMAN: THE WAKE, Ninth Art looks back at the book that put Vertigo on the map and revolutionised the trade market, and asks if it lives up to its reputation as one of the great long-form comic stories.

Now this is kinda funny and sad too, I guess. I just remembered it now.
Last Monday after our presentation in comm3 where we were required to wear business attires at the FC AVR, I was hanging out near Jofel's photocopying machines looking out for my groupmate's laptop while she was changing her clothes.
Wendell passed by and I sorta smiled at him and he says, "Hello, I haven't seen you for a decade!"
oh well...I haven't been loitering around FC for some time now. And i take it he means not only me but us as a group too.
I guess it's really been a while though we do meet but that's too far and few in between.

The previous weekend was great and I think Ely did quite well in narrating the events.Loads of fun and tons more.

Though after Bengki and I got home by 3pm, I had to leave again in less than an hour to go to the house of my comm3 groupmate--for that presentation I mentioned before. I was already late for the meeting in fact, but she lived in North Fairview so it wasn't much of a hassle, other than the usual comm3 hassle and the hassle from lack of decent sleep that is.

Arrived back home past 8pm. Stayed awake long enough to watch Star Trek IV which happens to be my favorite Star Trek movie (note:does not include any ST:TNG movies) because of the environmental implications and because Scotty tried talking to a computer using a mouse when they 'warped' back in time to 1984(?) to get 2 breeding humpback whales to save Earth of the 23rd century.(Probably got my centuries wrong, but it doesn't really matter.)

Anyway, fell asleep sometime after that and was woken up at around 8am by a text msg from my groupmate asking me to type and print the survey results (the survey which you guys took the time to answer--grazie) because we also needed to submit that document.

I don't want to go into more details, but I was sure glad when September 16 finally ended and I could get some rest.

I forgot to say I've been having really bad headaches from Thursday till Saturday last week and then again on Sunday till Tuesday. Bengki and Dell both suspect a migraine of sorts or I should have my eyes checked. I still haven't gotten around to doing that, of course.

And last Saturday before we went to Peloy's, I accompanied Dell and his comm3 groupmates for their interview of Budj. Talked to Budj about GRAIL for around 30 minutes afer their interview. Dell said I was sunshine-y?! I blame that on coffee-induced highs.

This entry seems confused. Must be because it's nonlinear. Crap.

check out this essay over at NInthArt.com. It's all about comics addiction!
The following is from that same article.

The Twelve-Step movement has some pointers for your self-help programme. Here are the twelve steps of admission for comic book users:

1. We admitted we were powerless over comics. Compared with the superheroes.

2. We came to believe that a Power greater than Superman could restore us to sanity.

3. We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to comics.

4. We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of our collections.

5. We admitted to a comics related internet forum, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our comics addiction.

6. We were entirely ready to have a sale to remove all these, even the ones without defects of cover.

7. We humbly asked if we could keep some trade paperback collections.

8. We made a list of all persons we had introduced to comics, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when their own addiction might jeopardise our own recovery.

10. We continued to take personal inventory and sold many comics via eBay.

11. We sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with Stan Lee as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the Powers to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to anyone who would listen, by going on about it at length in any appropriate internet discussions, and also many inappropriate ones. 'Nuff Said!

------------------------------
Though I admit, it doesn't really apply to all of us... hehehe

GRAIL activity slated for this weekend. Something to look forward to!
Ely now has a blog of her own. Sorry, Ely-lator. Can't find the time to add you to my list above as of now.
Oh look, another LotR quiz-y! =Þ

If I lived in Middle-Earth, it would be in: Lothlorien or Rivendell You prefer the tranquilty and peacefulness of nature and enjoy the milder seasons of the year. While you know it is necessary to keep in contact with other living beings, most of the time you enjoy the seclusion of an aesthetically pleasing, woodland environment. Take the "Where in Middle-Earth Would I Live?" Quiz by skepticism

and so its official... Isaw, atbp. won.
ya ya..we were rooting for One Night, of course.
I would like to say some more...but I don't really dare...someday when I'm brave enooough to bash (bitch?)... =Þ

--------------------



The Faculty Quiz
created by Alex

we just liked this movie cos of the uhhh...drugs?
but it ruins my layout gain. oh well.

Has anyone else ever done this? I mean, do online research then be unable to complete downloading what you've found, then unfortunately (stupidly!) forget about it for a couple of months? Then when you remember it, the website has already changed address and format and you can't find the damn article which was really promising and could have helped tons with your thesis?

me dumb.founded.

oh...that Arnold Arre graphic novel will be out at last in a few days. Hmmm...254 pages daw. Hmm..I'm glad I don't have to think of including that in my "thesis" anymore. For sure, I don't have the money to buy it these days. So that's that for now.

We've been talking about it the National Book Awards for Comics before...so this year contenders are Isaw,atbp. and One Night In Purgatory as expected. I guess we know which one we want to win. =)

It's almost September...why am I not panicking? It's not as if I'm not worried...oh I am worried.. but I feel dead? O_O

You are Civilian Calvin! You don't get to travel much outside your neighborhood, but you still manage to get in plenty of trouble. When you're not acting up, you like to wax philosophical. Take the What Calvin are You? Quiz by contessina_2000@yahoo.com!

We watched TripleX yesterday. And I mean the Vin Diesel movie.
And we got 2 quotable quotes from said movie...weell, it was quotable for bengki and me, anyway!

Yorgi to Xander (with a Czech accent): With enough vodka, everything is alright.

Gibbons to Xander: I'm an authority figure. I'm supposed to inspire you.

so there.

Since to day is officially Wednesday and it is the middle of August....
I haven't blogged for three or is it just 2 weeks?
I don't think I have the right sense of time anymore but what the hell...I'm gonna quote from Jack Kerouac's On The Road just because I want to and it's about time and maybe not.

"Now you just dig them in front. They have worries, they're counting the miles, they're thinking about where to sleep tonight, how much money for gas, the weather, how they'll get there--and all the time they'll get there anyway, you see. But they need to worry and betray time with urgencies false and otherwise, purely anxious and whiny, their souls really won't be at peace unless they latch on to an established and proven worry and having once found it they assume facial expressions to fit and go with it, which is, you see, unhappiness, and all the time it all flies by them and they know it and that too worries them no end."

uuhh..that's somewhere in Part 3, Chapter 5 of the book if anyone cares to know.

Some of the stuff i did for the past weeks can be gleaned from bengki's blog anyway.

And i don't really feel like writing anything... but i must have my Inuyasha character quiz-y and I'm:



What Inuyasha Character are you?

Sango?
Oh well...she's ok though I don't think being butt-grabbed by a monk is (even if she's in love with him!) hehe