Anyone wish to join me around the bend?

Hitman Reborn. Key rings/figures. Want. Unfortunately, they're all wrapped up so you have no idea which one you'll get, and at $10 a pop that's a lot of money for 3 or 5 Hibari figures. I'm sorry, Hibari, but I think I may hate you. It's not you, really. It's m-. No. It IS in fact you. Sod off.

Still, the risk might be worth it for Gokudera (WOO!), Dino (Woo!), Yamamoto (woo!), or Lambo (woo!).

Oh. And I think these Gokudera and Yamamoto plushies are cuter than the official ones. Also want.

I'm only getting demanding because it's almost my birthday, and these things happen at this time of the year.

Ok, I went to the Japanese wiki so I could get the ISBN for the gaiden, and found the google translations for the character descriptions to be made of awesome. I DARE someone to write fanfic based on the translated descriptions:

Lykouleon. 竜帝。 Emperor dragon. 竜族の王で、存在するだけで魔物を寄せ付けない。 The Dragon King of the tribe, exists only魔物inhospitable. そのため、魔物はリュクレオンが守っている竜城には入ることすらできない。 Therefore, the魔物Riyuu Zyou has kept the RYUKUREON not even enter. その血は竜妃以外には眩しすぎて、触れるだけで毒となり、たとえ竜族であろうとも苦しんで死ぬこととなる。 In addition to the dragon blood is too眩SHI Princess and at the touch of poison, death and suffering that the family would even dragons.

So, Lykouleon is inhospitable, a princess, and ... something else.


Raseleane. 竜妃。 Dragon Princess. かつてナディルにさらわれたことがあり、その際、竜妃の証である竜の眼を奪われた。 NADIRU be swept away in the past, when the eye of the dragon lost his wife a certificate of the dragon. やわらかい性格で、竜城のものは誰も逆らえない。 The soft nature, castle dragon逆RAENAI anyone.

Damn you, not her dragon certificate! Without that piece of paper she's just an ordinary human!

Luwalk. 黄の竜官。 The yellow dragon. 竜帝の幼馴染み。幼馴染MI Dragon Emperor. 私生活では竜帝と友人関係を築いており、口調も友人同士のものとなる。 In his personal life and relationships with friends Dragon Emperor, will be a tone of friends. また女官長セルノズーラとの会話は親しいものがある。 SERUNOZURA long conversation with the maid of honor or something close.

Aw, so Ruwalk has a tone of friends and perhaps a thing for maids of honor.

Alfeage. 白の竜官。 The white dragon. 竜帝の秘書官。 Secretary of the Dragon Emperor. 竜帝の自由奔放さにいつも頭を痛めている。 Always have a bad head dragon emperor to abandon. 竜帝に対する言葉遣いや、公務の書類製作は厳密を極める。 Wording for the dragon emperor and created a master document is strictly for official business. リュクレオンの変装を見破る特技を持ち、ルウォークやカイスターンはおろか、リュクレオンにすら手厳しく説教をする。 See through the disguise of a specialty RYUKUREON, and Stern Kai RUUOKU mention, even in preaching RYUKUREON mordantly.

I'm sorry, all I got from the third sentence is that Lykouleon abandoned him because he always gave bad head. But then, I am a perv. I wonder what a speciality Kai-stern DOES by the way... still a perv

Kaistern. 青の竜官。 The blue dragon. 竜帝の命を受け、つねに西の大陸を駆け回っており、竜都にいることはほとんどない。 Upon the order of the Dragon Emperor, and dribbling the continent in the west always that little dragon in the capital. 最もラスに好かれているフリをされている。 Pretended to be the most popular in class.

Aw, it's not Kai-stern's fault he's the little dragon in the capital~ Plus, I love how the last sentence is good english, and yet is completely disconnected to anything in DK. Heh. Pretended to be the most popular in class. WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?!

Teceous. 黒の竜官。 The black dragon. もと魔族でシャイデマン、シャイレンドラの兄。 Magic in the Scheidemann group, SHAIRENDORA brother. そのため魔物の気配には人一倍敏感である。 A whiff of魔物Therefore it is twice as sensitive. 物語開始時の四人の竜官の中では最も強い。 The dragon in the story at the start of the four strongest. 素手で魔物と戦うこともある。魔物have to fight with bare hands.

Tetheus smells and is therefore more sensitive. Got it.

Lots more funny stuff to be found. Never change, google translate. Never change.

The latest chapter is finally out on http://www.gougouzhizuozu.com.

Aw, Touji. You really are the sweetest, most awesome character in the series. Since this chapter is (almost) all about Touji getting lots of love from the characters, it might just be my favorite. He's just so happy and everyone is just so devastated for him ... poor darling.

I hope that the chapter gets translated, because I sorta really want to write some fanfic for it, but I don't feel at all comfortable doing it from the raws.

Because we can never, ever have too many fics in this fandom =).

This year's Fic Battle over at saiunkoku_fic is now taking prompt requests. I know some people have drifted away from the fandom recently, but even if you just want to flood the challenge with lots of requests then that would make me a very relieved panda be really awesome.

The link for those who are interested: http://community.livejournal.com/saiunkoku_fic/80458.html

(Yes. This post is just a gratuitous advertisement. I am ashamed. or should be)

I don't think it's come up much in my journal, but I've been pretty sick these last few months. After my exams I finally decided to go to the doctor and have myself checked out, as up until then I'd kept putting it down to stress etc. And, yeah. It's nothing terrible on the whole scale of nothing-terribleness, but I am going to have to have my gallbladder removed and my poor liver has been abused in ways that need some tender loving care to fix.

As a result, I'm feeling pretty down. I've sort of been in a mood - not angry or sulky, just ... down. Very down.

To try and combat that, I've joined a fic challenge: Genre twisting (http://genretwisting.dreamwidth.org/). Basically, you give either six or 10 characters from a fandom, plus one of 5 genres to 'twist' your fandom to. You are then assigned a number of prompts within that genre to write. Should be fun. I've submitted six characters each for Saiunkoku and Dragon Knights, plus a 10 character mixed list (Saiunkoku, Dragon Knights, Magic Knights Rayearth, Tenshi ni Narumon) for a cracky crime/thriller list of prompts. While it's mainly on dreamwidth, sign-ups are also on livejournal: http://community.livejournal.com/genretwisting/

Hopefully this might help lift my mood a little.

Exams, be gone! Terrible, the lot of them. The last one even drove me to drink. I don't think I've had anything to drink in years. So many things to catch up on, so many uncompleted ficlets to try and push out in these next three weeks.

I will try and do a catch up, but I'm still officially in 'crash mood'. I'm so use to getting up early to study and going to bed at past midnight (when I'm not as sick as a dog - damn you stress!) that my body is trying to zombie its way through those same hours even when the rest of me just wants to sleeeeep.

So, my exams start next Saturday. I'm getting through the stress by designating a couple of hours from about 10pm until midnight to just blobbing out and writing. This hasn't gone too well as I've been attempting to do the June Fic_on_demand daily fic challenge, which has resulted in some really crappy ficlets being submitted. There is only so much that can be written in a couple of hours =)

Today I've been less strict with my studying, and worked a little on the Hogwarts!Saiunkoku AU. It's such a fun universe to work in, and I just love busybody Kouyuu. He's currently pulling out all the stops in an attempt to save Seiran from Kochou, with Ensei and Shuuei going along with it all because chibi!Kouyuu is too cute to resist when he gets all worked up about something. I really wish I was a better writer than I am, because there is this one scene between Ensei and Seiran that just plays out perfectly in my head, but I'm having a really difficult time capturing it on paper. It would be easier if I was one of those people who plots/visualize a story in words, but I rely very heavily on mental imagery. I find it VERY difficult to translate that into words.

It does help, however, that I have a new muse to sit on my computer table next to Fat Arsed Wombat (my usual muse and study mate). Yay, thank-you Grey! You are made of awesome. He is very cute.

The white robes that Shuurei et al wear after they've sat their exams and have taken on their first government position were called ...?

THANKIES!

I was reading one of the part translations of volume 14, and it was interesting to see Ryuuki thinking about how problematic it ended up being that Shuuei and Kouyuu came from privileged backgrounds. One of the downsides about volume 13 (as amazing as it was) was that everything pretty much happened in Kouyuu’s head. I’m really hoping that there is a big reveal of some kind eventually, because both You Shuu and Ryuuki especially are very wary at the moment about the sort of background Kouyuu simply doesn’t come from. I think for Kouyuu to move on as well, he needs to actually work through all the issues he finally admitted to in volume 13. I think he took huge steps in that novel, but his beliefs didn’t just affect his relationship with Reishin but with everyone else as well. Hell, those beliefs shaped his entire role in life. That’s why I’m dying for him to talk to any of the other characters about his past, because it would show he’s growing to believe in their trust and affection.

The terrible thing is that this month’s challenge over at the Saiunkoku challenge community is ‘revelations’. I’m hoping someone else writes it so I don’t have to. No time! I have no time!

Oh noes, they're hijacking our cruise ship! I have the weirdest friends. Put me in that position and I would be absolutely terrifed. And useless. And probably hiding under my bed. I would NOT be emailing people back home and letting them all know how the unfolding drama was going to make the BEST holiday trip story ever. My friends are far cooler than I ever will be. Still? Nuts.

Swine flu: from Mexico to New Zealand? Dude. We're supposed to be safe down here. It's one of the best things about living completely isolated at the bottom of the world. It's weird how it spread from Mexico into the US ... and then to Israel and New Zealand. Logically, it doesn't make sense. Geographically, it doesn't make sense. Granted, it's carried on planes, but it's not like there is huge air traffic between Mexico and New Zealand. Very scary.

Why no, I'm not avoiding working on an essay. Why would you ever think that? I'm just surrounded by 40 books on Social Constructionism because they make such good wind breaks/coke cup holders/food rests!

The meme! To save me from my ... uh ... footrests. They're nibbling my toes, really!

Give me a character and I'll tell you how they lost their virginity. You pretty much all know the fandoms I'm in by now, so yeah. Ask away ^_^

I was flicking through google!images for a particular Kouyuu picture, and instead I refound this:

http://nimoe.wordpress.com/2008/08/04/kouyuu-amigurumi/

Sigh. This is one of those artsy things I would love to be able to make. In fact, I tried to learn amigurumi just so I could make my own little Kouyuu. It ... ended badly. I couldn't even do one stitch. Not one. This was even after buying books, watching online videos in super slow motion, and having somone actually show me how to do it and patiently try and help me as much as possible. No two ways about it, I suck at this sort of thing.

A second fanfic meme fic. I started this fic immediately after I received the prompt, but sadly lost the original story thread I had which was much more complex. As a result, I pretty much tied up the story where it was instead of leaving it unfinished on my computer for another year. Requested by Misura in December, 2008 (that's not to bad, right?).

Title: Promises.
Fanfic meme: 5 Times Yue has asked Vaith to trust him. Takes place in the cluttered last volume.

( promises )

Unbelievable as it may seem, I actually do intend to finish all the fic prompts I've ask for ^_^. This one was requests by Malnisst back in January, 2008. Yes, I am a ridiculous slacker. Maybe I should do this in reverse and try and complete the really oldest requests first ....

Title: Love, Conditional.
Fanfic meme fic: Ryuuki having a sleepover with Kouyuu (platonic or note), as Shuuei and Kouyuu seem to be the only junior court officials he hasn’t bedded. For Malnisst.

Notes: Back when the Saiunkoku fandom was young, Truth (I believe) wrote a couple of amazing fics that really hinted at how disastrous it would be for Kouyuu if he became one of Ryuuki’s nightly bed warmers. She picked up way back then how big a problem conditional affection would be for Kouyuu in such a situation (“I need you because I no longer have Shuurei”), and how it would just confirm the beliefs he had about himself. Given the direction the novels took with Kouyuu’s issues WITH what he perceived to be conditional affection, I think she was an author well before her time =). This is just a ten minute ficlet so it doesn’t go into any of the depth that those fics do, but it’s certainly really interesting to write about a season 1 idea now that we’ve got the knowledge of the later novels.

( Love, Conditional )

Damn, New Zealand. Way to make chasing 180 as difficult as possible. We won, which is absolutely fabulous, but what I'm really curious to find out is what is going to happen with Haddin.

Because you know what? He cheated. There are a LOT of grey areas in cricket. Not walking when you get an edge, appealing when you know the batsman's not out. However, what Haddin did went beyond that in my opinion. Because it's likely I'm the only person who saw the game with Toriko in Japan, Broom (kiwi batsman) was given out bowled. What really happened was that Haddin (Australian wicketkeeper) knocked the bails off with his gloves. The ball went OVER the bails. He knew exactly what had happened - the replays showed that he saw it happen and his reactions are pretty damning - and not only didn't he say anything but appealed the wicket and celebrated it. Pretty damn shocking, and the Australian commentators went quiet on the topic very quickly.

Vettori mentioned it in the post play, just as he should have. And Ponting ... well. He's a sour, pissy man of late. I used to love Ponting, but he really doesn't wear losing well, and when you defend a cheating team mate and try and turn it back onto the other team, that's just tasteless. Additionally, Ponting pretty much flaunts his disdain for the over rate rule. It's not a choice, Ponting. You can't make the decison that it's worth deliberately slowing the game down and spending ages with field placings even if it means a fine. It's pretty damn obvious that he does it whenever he wants to and doesn't care about the punishment, and quite frankly I think he deserves another two game ban because it's a blatant and continuous disregard for the rules.

Man, Ponting. I used to LOVE you. Especially when you did that series of deodorant commercials with Steven Fleming.

Arg. Bring back Brett Lee, we need some good natured cheer back in the Aussie team again so I can go back to loving them again.

Damn, those were really thought provoking prompts! I had to stop writing a couple of them as they were starting to take on a life of their own. The Kai-stern one especially was getting really depressing to write - that sequel better bring him back, damn it!

Title: 5 things Lykouleon does that keeps Raseleane around.
Summary: 5 things fic for vuirneen, who wanted Lykouleon and Raseleane fanfic.
Rating: PG.
Notes: It's amazing how much easier I find it to write characters I like but don't love than those I adore madly. Of course, it might just be that it's easier to write characters who are so canonically in love.

( Cut to: 5 things Lykouleon does that keeps Raseleane around )

Uh ... the five things fanfic meme. Give me a character/pairing/whatever and a 'five things' prompt. Eg: 5 things Kouyuu never knew before he met Reishin, 5 things Kai-stern does that annoy Tetheus, etc etc.

Fandoms? The usual suspects, including but not limited to: Saiunkoku, Dragon Knights, Faeries Landing, Magical x Miracle (if your name starts with M and ends with isura ^-^), Hitman Reborn, One Piece, anything else I have any knowledge of ...

www.santas.net has information about different countries Christmas traditions. It doesn't seem like a joke site as the entries for the handful of other countries I checked out seemed normal, but the entry for New Zealand ....

In New Zealand Christmas is combined with summer holidays, so as well as present-buying and parties, families are preparing for trips to the beach. Shops are decorated with Father Christmas in his red cloak and white beard, as well as snow scenes.

Yep, that's fine.

The New Zealand traditions of Christmas have mostly come through the English settlers who began arriving their in the late 18th Century. In the last 20 or 30 years the persona of Father Christmas had changed and he is referred to as Santa Claus and has become much more like the Santa of the United States and Ireland. As well people have been forced to change as a result of the Maori culture. The spirits and creatures of the Maori culture resemble the elves and gnomes of European Christmas traditions.

WTF. What. The. FUCK? That is ... WTF?! I ... that's ...you've ... what?!

They celebrate the story of the birth of Jesus Christ with a special service, which is appropriate to New Zealanders way of life as they had no motels, and they have many shepherds who take care of their flocks, in doing so they can see the true meaning of Christmas.

I ... no words.

In New Zealand the traditional Christmas dinner is roast turkey with vegetables and sauces. For dessert it is rich, fruity Christmas pudding with brandy sauce. Mince pies, pastry cases filled with a mixture of chopped dried fruit.

Man, Turkey is difficult as hell to get here - we have christmas hams.

A New Zealand Christmas is all about spending time with family, eating COLD food because it's so bloody hot, and presents. We're a secular country so some people do go to midnight mass, but the average person spends it at home with their loved ones.

It was released today, and yet I can't find anything ...

Grey is doing an absolutely brilliant job with it, so if you've left signing up to the very last minute (like me) now would be a good time to sign up ^_^ Ask for Kouyuu fic! Or You Shuu fic! Or Kouyuu and You Shuu fic! Or Kouyuu and Reishin or Kouyuu and Shuuei fic! Or even fic that doesn't feature Kouyuu at all!

http://community.livejournal.com/saiunkoku_fic/64275.html

GOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGO! I love you all but we only have 14 hours to save the earth a few hours left. Wooo-ooo!