Title: The Thief's Guide To Dragons (1/?)
Fandom: Hunter X Hunter
Words: 1,192
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Three words: "dragon-bonded", "KuroPika", and "enablers". B|

( Sob. )

I think I'm stuck in some kind of creative rut. I've been TRYING to write, and there's definitely the itch to produce something, but I keep getting sidetracked, whether through my own lack of concentration or because of circumstances that can't be helped. I've been rereading stuff I wrote in the last couple of years, and I keep wondering just how I was able to write all these things. Sometimes I worry that I'm losing the ability entirely.

... Hnnngh. Time for lists. They make it easier for me to focus.

Major projects / Long-term commitments / The more important WIPs.
--WH chapter 23. Gawd, I want to finish the transition/developmental chapters already so I can get to the sex.
--Edits for the Minibang final draft.
--That 6927/2769 thing for g3ssh0ku. It's gotten ridiculously long, but since I forgot my flash drive at home, I have no way of checking the word count at the moment.
--New material for Reborn/Temeraire.

Brainfarts / Quickies / "I may turn to these in my desperation."
--Another one-liner meme. This time really stick to the one-line rule.
--That collab 1827 RP!fic with izkariote.
--More HxH pilotverse, this time about when they just started out as partner pilots.
--Kuroro and Kurapika as a dragon-bonded pair.

I'm not forgetting anything important, am I.

---

I wonder why I never inherited the ability to sing. I used to sing when I was younger, I mean, it's not like there aren't opportunities for me to develop my voice. My mom sings well. We have tons of tapes and CDs. The master bedroom is equipped with a sound system that should belong in a theater somewhere. And I'd like to think that I'm not tone-deaf like my dad is.

That could be it. Genes from my tone-deaf father probably canceled out any potential ability I might have gotten from my mother. :/

Ffffff. That fandubbed version of Imitation Black is slowly consuming my soul.

I've been thinking of trimming my f-list for a while now. Not that I have a big f-list, but I'm really horrible at keeping up with new posts and replying to comments, and there are a few things I'd like to change so that it'd take me less time to go through everything - also so I'd have more time to read the posts that do matter to me more thoroughly.

I might defriend the people whose journal entries I never comment on, plus the people who never comment on my entries. That sounds like a good place to start. So it's nothing personal, more like, the both of us don't seem to be getting anything by keeping each other in our f-lists. Can't relate anymore, in other words. For some of those - I used to read their entries from start to end, but I never comment because I don't have anything I want to say. But lately I've been skimming through those entries, not only because I don't have the time, but also because the content never feels relevant to me anymore.

IDK, it's also possible that I'm just not feeling like myself at the moment, and could look at this entry tomorrow and wonder where the hell it came from, but--

It's also true that there are journal entries I never read properly anymore, and I feel that it's pretty disrespectful of me to be keeping those accounts on my f-list when I can't even be bothered to spend a couple of minutes reading them, and at least making the effort to wonder if there's anything I can respond with. I'm sure those people would appreciate having one less whiner to deal with on their f-lists, too.

So, if--
--you never comment on my entries, and
--you've never seen me commenting on your entries, like, not a single comment in the last year--

There's a pretty good chance that I'll be defriending you in the next few days. Please comment here if you still want me lurking around your entries.

Koushien, you guys are automatically exempted from this.

I wanted to do something self-gratifyingly productive for this weekend, like write, start playing either Devil Survivor or Devil Summoner 2, or take lots and lots of pictures of my shedding rabbits.

Unfortunately, I woke up to find the back of my throat clogged with thick yellow phlegm, my head playing host to a pounding headache, the thermometer giving the reading for a low-grade fever, and Manila being stiflingly hot, as usual.

So I drugged myself and marathoned downloads the entire day. I'd take a sick leave for tomorrow, too, but the boss had already scheduled me to attend a status update meeting with one of the project managers.

--Watching Ristorante Paradiso is making me want to ditch everything and fly to Italy and find my own bespectacled 50-something gentleman. And I want part 2 of Impact now.

--Transformers 2 was... less seamless than its predecessor. The ending felt rushed, I never found out that that sexy silver Chevrolet Corvette was actually Sideswipe - who, along with his twin Sunstreaker, keeps getting portrayed as a Lamborghini in fanfiction, so I was understandably curious and excited to see how their characters would translate to the big screen - until I went home and researched the cast and characters. (Wait, Wikipedia, you mean to say that there was another Autobot there named Jolt who wielded a pair of electric whips?) Also, where did everyone else go after the last battle?? Hahaha... Oh, but I enjoyed it immensely. Bumblebee was adorable, there were a lot of close-ups of the robots' faces, and Optimus. *A* Optimus Prime there kicked so much ass. Jetfire was amajing, too. :>

--Parents have asked me to download Michael Jackson's albums. Now I'm tripping on his songs. :'(

I wrote 576 words for chapter 23 yesterday.

Which takes the grand total to 1,260 words. Which is about a fifth of my usual chapter length.

I'M GETTING THERE.

..... It's pathetic how happy I already am with this measly word count. I used to be able to write a chapter a month. ;A;

[Edit:] Nope, the amount of UST-heavy fanfic I've been reading the past week won't have any bearing whatsoever on how I'm writing my KuroPika at the moment.

If there is one person or more on your friends list who makes your world a better place just because they exist, and who you would not have met (in real life or not) without the Internet, then post this same sentence in your journal.

I wouldn't be exaggerating if I say that I'm the person I am now because of people I met through the Internet, and I definitely like the person I am now.

Pick a character that I have written/RP'd, or that you know I have substantial headcanon about, and ask any five questions about him/her.

Well... considering that I've technically RP'ed only three characters, and I've already written about all three in fics...

---

Reborn spazz. Feel free to skip this part.

If the current pattern holds, it looks like all six of Tsuna's Guardians are going to be carbon copies of Giotto's Guardians. Or rather, the entire set will be lookalikes/clones/reincarnations/what-have-you, including Tsuna, since he's the very first one that's all but confirmed to be the splitting image of the Vongola Primo, despite Amano being coy about it. And their Vongola boxes will all be capable of transforming into things that belonged to their counterparts in the Primo set - there's Giotto's mantle for Tsuna and Giotto's Rain Guardian's sword for Yamamoto.

... Can't wait to see Gokudera's. ♥

Their box animals also have weird eyes. 3 pupils. .-. It makes them look... more dangerous somehow, which I'd never object to, but it's definitely weird. No one's saying anything about it, but I keep thinking that it's gotta mean something special.

--Of course I'm not complaining about the boys looking like Giotto and his Guardians. Or the weapons being copied out of other manga/anime. Sometimes cliched is the way to go, and it's all still epic as far as I'm concerned. |D

[Edit:] Yamamoto why are you so sexy. Also, it's stupid how you can be loldorable in a chapter where you're also being sexy. That dog totally suits him, by the way.

Iran: I think everyone's seen the reposts of one_hoopy_frood's original messages by now, so I'll just say that, considering how unbelievably oppressive the dictator in question is being, and how long the protesters have persevered under such violent circumstances, it doesn't look like either side's going to give way. One of them is going to break, and I hope it's not the citizens marching in the streets at this moment.

In case you don't know what's been happening, on the other hand, this post and this other post serve as pretty good primers, with links to other informative websites. I learned about what was happening through reposts of both LJ entries in my F-list.

---

On a maybe-related thread: If you had a Noblesse Oblige phone like the ones in Eden of the East, if someone gave you 10 billion [insert whatever currency you use] in digital cash and told you to spend it however you see fit - you can buy a mall or make the president of your country say "weaboooo" on national TV - how would you use it all? Or, as an added clause, if told that you need to use it to "save" your country, what would you do?

I'd probably focus on education and economic independence. First, own the supposedly oil-rich region beside the Palawan islands and make sure that no other country has any more claim on it, then build functional, self-sufficient oil rigs on it so we can finally be rid of our dependence on oil imports.

Second, build as many public schools as needed to fit every child of age without repeating the overcrowded conditions in Philippine classrooms at the present. Hire enough competent teachers, stock everything that's needed - books, paper, pens, uniforms, lunches, comfort rooms - and most of all, offer it all for free, for at least one generation of kids to make it through all the way to college, or until my funds run out - whichever comes first. I believe that that's the way to fast-track progress on a large and permanent scale, even if it takes at least 20 years for a child to grow from preschool age until college, but at the end of it all, we'd have a generation of informed and educated fresh graduates who'd know enough about the world to know where they'd be the most useful. The rest would surely follow once this first batch of graduates start doing things to change society for the better with the education they have.

.-. Of course, their general education curriculum might have to be tailored a bit to make sure that they won't grow up to be elitists who'd only fly the coop to greener pastures abroad the moment they're through being put through free education. Or politicians who'd only go into politics and cheat the uneducated public out of their hard-earned money.

And if I still had money left over after that, I'd book a first class round-trip ticket to Japan and stuff myself silly on food.

No, I'm really curious. What would you do?

---

[Edit:] My Minibang entry still hasn't been adopted by an artist. ;w; I'm starting to think that I'd rather not get an artist than get assigned one just because no one would pick it up.

My lovely artist, whoever you are, thank you so much for choosing my entry. ;A;

Oh, look. I finally managed to finish something that isn't Reborn.

Title: Monsters
Fandom: Ares
Words: 2,713
Rating: PG-13
Summary: So they all died in the last Ares fic that I wrote. This is the continuation.

Then again, it doesn't actually count towards my overall level of productivity since I wrote like 90% of the entire thing over the span of 11 months.

---

I want to write Tierkreis fic. I really really really do. But I'll consciously want my Sieg to be as awesomely stupid as the Sieg here, and... I don't think it's possible. :'D That level of idiocy borders on genius, naa.

---

I wanted to drop Pandora Hearts at first because the first episode didn't feel that interesting. The animation quality is a bit low, too, especially after you've been replaying HD copies of Sengoku Basara. I'm glad I stuck with it. ♥ There's a giant, black scythe-wielding rabbit, after all, and the Jack-Oz dynamic reminds me so much of Giotto and Tsuna.

Gil kind of feels like a more tsundere TYL Gokudera, come to think of it. .__.

.....

Oh, no. OH NO. STOPPIT BRAIN, NO TRYING TO CROSS THOSE TWO SERIES TOGETHER, IT IS CLEARLY IMPOSSIBLE--

Title: Trial by Fire, 6/?
Series: Reborn/Temeraire
Characters: Tsuna and Mukuro, Yamamoto and Gokudera (quick appearance from Reborn, Colonello, and Ryohei)
Summary: If aviators kept photo albums, this chapter would be aptly named “Mukuro at Week 1”.
Notes: I can't find the file where I keep my notes for this. Maybe it's in my laptop at home. =/

( Extreme demolition job! )

Title: Trial by Fire, 5/?
Series: Reborn/Temeraire
Characters: Dino and Reborn
Summary: Dino reacts to what happened in the harnessing.
Notes: This chapter is a lot shorter than the others. I'M NOT EVEN SURE IF THE STORY NEEDS IT, just that--I had to end the previous chapter sometime and take a break by using another POV and find a good transitioning scene before starting on the next massive chapter. +_+

( The usual. Reborn stringing his former student along with mysterious hints and foreboding smirks. )

I think one of the main reasons why I'm loving Reborn so much right now, despite the glaring plotholes and the stupidity of it all (Jesus!Byakuran's face in the sky, anyone?) is because I'm like a little boy when it comes to reading fiction. I love it when main characters are epic and almost ridiculously overleveled. Bonus points when they start out weak and unassuming and wimpy and then visibly grow and mature over the course of the story. Seriously, when I read the Kokuyo arc and saw Hyper Dying Will Tsuna for the first time, after all those chapters of Tsuna running around in his boxers? I felt like Buddha obtaining Nirvana. I felt that again when he saved Chrome and Ken and Chikusa after Mosca when on its rampage, again when he was acknowledged by the previous Vongola bosses, again when he successfully fired a stable X-Burner with Spanner's help, and now after he knocked Torikabuto out with a single punch. And I have a really bad case of main character crush - I'll fall for almost every main character who's drawn well and who has even the slightest iota of fighting ability. Or, if the main character is too dumb or too much of a jackass, I'll probably go for the blond sidekick instead. And Amano! Amano's drawing style pings me on all levels - the epic full-page spreads, the full-body poses, the constant focusing on the eyes, the suits and the weapons and the techniques! The techniques might not be original (I mean, Tsuna's mantle reminds me of Allen's Crowned Clown, and Yamamoto's swords look too much like spirit blades to me), but like I'd give two farts about the originality of the characters' moves. It's epic, it's gratuitously shounen, it's impossible in real life, it's really quite uncomplicated if you just enjoy it for what it is, and it sends me to a happy place.

And there are so many little details that I keep realizing after the fact - I have no idea if Amano wrote them in on purpose or if they just happened to be there by luck. I read this 6927 doujinshi by Zeroshiki last night. Mukuro in there said that he's envious of the Cloud, because the Cloud is the nearest to the Sky. All the others, too - Rain, Storm, Sun, Lightning. It's only the Mist who is the farthest from the Sky, and I was like, whoa, that's right. D: Mist creeps along the ground, and it evaporates the moment the sky lightens up.

It's kind of sad if I think about it seriously in the 6927 context. ;3;

---

From ficcentricity:

What fic would you write if you had infinite time, motivation, and absolutely no shame? (Alternately what would you draw!)

1) A complete revamp of WH - I want to rewrite everything with my current style, and make it better and give it a new title, but I think about how much I've written and how much I'm going to have to edit and rewrite, and I immediately feel my soul quaking in terror.

2) That FF7 continuation fic I've all but abandoned. I had this suitably dramatic scene planned where Sephiroth goes berserk and Cloud literally impales himself on the Masamune because it's the only way he could get close enough to hug Sephiroth, fashdakfsgdaf shut up I was like 18 when I thought of it

3) I'd finish drawing that KHR alternative sports series. I'd actually managed to scrawl a recognizable Tsuna and Gokudera and Mukuro, but the next Guardian in line was supposed to be Hibari in an equestrian dressage competition, with the horse he's riding in mid-jump. And, like, I just have this tendency to shrivel up and die whenever I realize that I've taken on a project that's too big for me. +__+

4) I'd finish writing Reborn/Temeraire in one go.

5) All the other writing projects I haven't finished yet, no matter how old they are. And... there's a lot, so I won't list them here. ;;;

---

I finished writing the first draft of my Minibang entry just a couple of hours before it turned June 15 in my part of the world. :'D I keep getting the distressing feeling that the second half's too rushed compared to the slow first half, though. +_+

I'm going to treat myself by posting something and not-so-subtly soliciting for comments.

Falling asleep in the middle of writing for the Minibang. Imma take a break with this meme. =w=

Copied from misskalloway:

Name your 15 absolutely favorite couples (het/slash/canon/fanon) and ask people to see what trends they notice about your couples. Try to pick different fandoms.

1) Katekyo Hitman Reborn -- Mukuro/Tsuna (secondary pairing is Gokudera/Tsuna)
2) Pandora Hearts -- Gil/Oz (Well. Oz/Alice is cute, too.)
3) Final Fantasy 7 -- Sephiroth/Cloud (I love miko_no_da's Zack/Cloud, though.)
4) Hunter X Hunter -- Kuroro/Kurapika
5) Suikoden Tierkreis -- Roberto->Sieg
6) Kuroshitsuji -- Sebastian/Ciel
7) Star Trek -- Spock/Kirk (/only got into it after watching the movie and seeing Zachary Quinto and Chris Pine, orz)
8) 07-Ghost -- Mikage/Teito (Unfortunately, Mikage's dead, which leaves Frau/Teito and the rarer, more disastrous Ayanami/Teito)
9) Ares -- OT3 (like, Michael and Baruna and Ares, yes)
10) Kyou Kara Maou -- Conrad/Yuri
11) One Piece -- Zoro/Sanji hahaha I like stupid pairings too okay
12) Ace Attorney -- Edgeworth/Phoenix
13) Temeraire -- Temeraire & Laurence, but only in the purest sense of their partnership. T^T They obviously belong with each other, and Temeraire will probably follow Laurence when he dies of old age. (although I don't mind Tharkay/Laurence, either |D)
14) Hetalia -- America/England? (episode 20 killed me ajsdfaskgfaskf)
15) Ookiku Furikabutte -- Abe/Mihashi

No, I don't see any common trends. :'D Except that they're all gay. I mean, I have canon het couples that I like, but I can't think of any het couple that might set me off so badly that I'd actually start squealing and spazzing out loud.

My Minibang entry is at 6,600 words. When am I going to stop being TL;DR? OTL

--AND THIS.

I WILL FINISH IT. I SWEAR I WILL.

JUST. GIMME TIME TO SUCK UP ENOUGH WRITING MOJO AGAIN.

I know, it's been more than a year, but. I had work. And Reborn. And a lot of shiny things and--did I mention Reborn?

LEMME FINISH MY MINIBANG ENTRY FIRST, YEAH? I'LL WORK ON CHAPTER 23 AFTER THAT.

I'm such a bad LJ friend. ( This is why. )

IT'S THE WEEKEND. OH GLORIOUS WEEKEND. SOMEONE TIE ME DOWN TO A CHAIR AND FORCE ME TO WRITE UNTIL I FINISH MY MINIBANG.

---

Hi, thelovemafia! ♥ You are making me itch to finish that damned minibang entry so I can get back to writing Reborn/Temeraire. And I still can't believe that I'm LJ friends with you. >A<)

I had to go through the usual icon posts while (sneakily) checking my F-list earlier. One of them had Digimon icons. Specifically Yamato icons, and I just had to realize two things. One, this was a really. Long time ago. Two, was that I really had to have had a thing for blonds even way back then, because, dude, this character is a kid. Stick-thin arms, huge eyes, strange fashion sense, and kind of a bratty personality at first - I don't understand how or why I managed to form a massive crush on him.

Was it because his hair style and eye color reminded me of Cloud Strife?

Then again, I had extremely odd tastes in shounen characters back in grade school.

( Cut for seafood picspam. )

( Cut for rabbit picspam. 8D )

Lastly - since this is turning into some kind of update post, anyway - dad had his operation last Wednesday to remove an inguinal hernia on his left abdomen. I was worried for a bit because he's already 64 - that's not exactly young anymore. But it was successful, and he's home now and recovering well. His doctors were surprised because he didn't get the usual aftereffects of the operation. He didn't feel dizzy and he didn't feel any weakness, and he recovered quickly enough to be discharged last Saturday. .-. He was already wandering around the house yesterday and being his usual busybody self and - to mom's never-ending dismay - already poking around for work to do not even 4 days after an operation major enough to need anesthesia injected directly into his spinal column.

Figures that he'd be the difficult type of patient. ;;;

( Cut for flower picspam. XDD )

Tagged by khursten

( My undying love for Jyuudaime, let me show you it. )

09 → Tag five people and a character.

lonelybusiness - OBAMA
pineapple_samba - Gokudera :3
theprerogative - Something different... Um. Merlin?
g3ssh0ku - Mukuro
ficcentricity (if you don't mind getting tagged twice) - Roberto!

I realize that I'm starting to fall back into that habit of not posting regularly again, so, in b4 another of Amano's OMGWTFBBQ plot twists.

These four snippets are lifted off a work-in-progress... uh, set of 50 sentences snippets following the Gamma set from the 1sentence LJ community. It's vaguely 5927, yes, and was supposed to be dedicated to prerogative if only I'd managed to finish it not that long after her birthday, but.

Also related to the keysmash post I made a couple of weeks ago about Tsuna's previously-unknown box animal, but since it's looking more and more like some kind of wolf or dragon or dinosaur, I thought it prudent that I post these now before the real thing gets unveiled. I already feel stupid enough as it is. But a spazz is a spazz, and I enjoyed myself immensely. Now read on and hopefully enjoy the fruits of that spazzfest.

( Box / Unknown / Talk / Hope )

... Aw, crap. I still have that long-ass 2759 fic. That and this and the Minibang. OTL

Starting to get sleepy because it's siesta tiems. Digging through my flashdrive to help keep myself awake. Unearthed several unfinished memes.

Music meme borrowed from dreamlessness. (I don't remember the instructions. Was it put your tracklist on random play and then see what comes up for each question?)

( Because I'm a lazy git and need constant breaks during work if I'm going to be significantly productive throughout the day. )

That RP meme everyone's been doing the past few days?

( I listed all the characters I got tagged with. Call it morbid curiosity even though I know what the pattern is. )

... And, no, I'm not doing it. It looks fun, but I want my brain in one piece. 8D;