274. Stable Internet

...I think, at least.

On one of the past internet-less nights, I felt the rare urge to flip through selected AIM logs from...say, 2006. It was surprising to recall that prior to college, I had chronically been at the mercy of a sadistic (DSL) router with a habit of disconnecting me every twenty minutes on average. Virtually every log I read had at least two instances of "What did you say after I said ____?" "Did you say anything after ____?" "Sorry, got disconnected again." "I know it says I was online but I really wasn't."

Equally unfathomable is the remembrance that, barely two years prior to the above, I was still using dial-up (and had the legendary habit of not signing on until all homework was finished).

Somewhere in the last five years, a stable high-speed broadband connection had become the assumed basic commodity.

I never could wrap my head around exponential curves.

267. Internet problems

Now a day will forever be missing. :<

I wish there was a reference database of what each height/BMI actually looks like, so my OCD tendencies could be satisfied when I make compilations like this. I was doing well until Shaka's stick-figure-ness totally threw my proportions off, and I pretty much gave up after Shura. Maybe fixable if I change it to silhouettes of their respective Cloths instead...?

I need to learn me a book of dramatic heroic male poses.

265. Expanse

"What can I do?" is the most frightening question I have ever asked myself.

Boundless choice, offered by absolute free reign, is a monstrosity that challenges my cognition like nothing else does.

264. Time drain

Whelp, guess I missed a timestamp again. There is something so fundamentally satisfactory about drawing (and learning to draw) armor that I surprise even myself. Added to the list of "Can't believe I didn't try this sooner" items.

263. Substance

is matter divided by space. Space
is method by mind to visualize time. Time
is measurable only through change in matter.

to matter

substantiate

262. Saga, take 2

Definitely gaining a better understanding of Saga's hair as we go. This one also conveniently reminds us of the age gap between these guys. A lot more to work on for tomorrow.

261. Even fanart

I had not the slightest clue.

Since popularity had died in the early 90s, anime production was dropped, and manga froze into permanent dormancy. Ten years later, a French man produced a series of short animation videos and illustrations depicting scenes of the then-manga-only Hades arc, which caused such a stir that the original creator himself became inspired, and hired the guy into his animation team. Hades was only then adapted into 3 OVAs which were modified to the French man's style - officially making his fan-originated interpretation canon.

He must have been a die-hard Gemini fan, because despite fair distribution of screen-time amongst the Goldies (and despite my strong pre-existing bias for Shaka and Mu), it was Saga who stood head and shoulders above all the rest. Saga, whom I do not recall at all from childhood.

For comparison's sake: Saga of the manga.

Saga of 80s animation:

Saga of 2003 Hades Sanctuary:

Feel the love with which he is recreated.

It even bleeds over to the little brother.

How he stands out from the pack is fucking unreal. (Possibly aided by the fact that he never wears his helmet except for one blink of a scene ever, but shh.)

And no, I'm not done fanning this one yet. Will be back with more fanart until I get him right to my satisfaction.

260. Human warmth

I really have nearly forgotten how nice it feels. Now would be the right time to go back to the phone lines, but the issue of schedule stands solidly in the way.

My feet are grounded (Are they?) in stability, but impulse lies at less than an arm's stretch away. Sometimes the urge feels so disturbingly palpable and palatable that I become engrossed with desire to factually find the cliff I've so often seen in a vision as refuge. An occurrence made frightening by its coming and going without a pattern of predictability. I allow myself to be dragged down, strings attached, by the same practicality and insatiable perfectionism that prevents me to flee via other venues as well. Thwarting my own escape, by all paths?

Small reliefs and distractions are all that still keep my glass-sharded innards contained within this tissue paper skin, conflicted in standpoint, reluctant of change, cowed by sacrifice, immobilized in the name of responsible care.

259. Kids

258. My libido is gone.

What the actual fuck.

257. Finding Toshiya

On the verge of giving Deg's entire discography a once-through, with focus on bass rather than Kyo or the guitars. DSS sounds like a very different body of work already. o_o

256. Mu and Shaka

Slow progress. Needs more hands.

Somehow I turned Saga from centerpiece to...cockblocker?? (Although, now that you look at it, even the canon arguably agrees. Which reminds me, I owe them fanart from at least six years ago. WHY CAN'T I HOLD ALL THESE EIGHTIES ANIMU HAIR?!)

This is strange. I need sleep.

255. Saga

Wanted to say I will start daily sketches from now on...but accidentally went way overboard with the paint and missed the timestamp for a Tuesday post. D= I now feel very much obliged to push this as much toward completion as I can, implying future work tomorrow later today.

The realization that this guy's my actual favorite was a strange conclusion to reach. I had been quite sure it was Shaka for the longest time. Sorry, childhood, but DEM EYES and DAT EXPRESSION

254. goodreads

is making me extremely self-conscious about how little I've read. So many things I want to catch up on...and somehow, so little time. I need to

a. draw
b. write
c. read

So far I've been (albeit begrudgingly and sometimes bullshittingly) committing to only one of the above. I need to whip myself for more.

253. Another life?

The only proof that I did indeed live the childhood I seem to remember is the magnitude of the gut reaction I have to images like this.

252. Natural Science

Finding the queen is my favoritest activity ever. They didn't have any ant farms though. =(

251. 何璟

It feels as if the identity associated with that name is simply a far-away memory implanted in my head. Was that person really me? I can no longer tell. When I walked her stomping grounds, with thirteen years of separation, I saw a pale scale model imitation of the locales I still sometimes dream in the interval between. When I had to greet people who knew only her, I could feel their expectation for a different person - not me - compressed down upon my shoulders as if willing me to shrink, or to speak.

Like her.

Somewhere between then and now, I had apparently lost the ability to speak. Instead of pouring endless words and conversation, I sit to observe their vitality. Too conscious of the moment, too awed by the fact of existence and act of speech.

This super-sensitive meta-awareness. Was it exponentially heightened only in the isolation of the last year? Or was it a slow, undetectably deepening phenomenon, brought to a highlight only by his strange colors this spring?

Threadbare.

250. Stagnation

Such a fine line between Heidegger's ontic and ontological. If only the idealism of one transfuses into living passion for the other. Let us reach out again.

Lest I forget.

249. Sangha

I want to be a nun.

248. Resurrection

I feel the throes of revival in this one. Stay tuned.

247. X HOURS IN WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER

Oh god goodbye time.

246. Expectation vs. delivery

The gap has never felt this insurmountably huge...to the point that I question whether I should even continue to draw/self-identify as one who draws--and hitting a note too close to depression as soon as I realize I'd even formed that thought in the first place.

Mini directional/identity crisis.

This guy, for instance, does not ever sit down to compose either melody or lyrics. During recording/production stage, he simply improvises tunes and words that come to him as he listens to the voiceless music the rest of the band has put together. In one interview, he says it pours from him as surely (and readily, and effortlessly) as blood flows from an open wound. This, especially on stage, is his sole mode of expression, conveyance...and general existence.

And then, this guy. Recent years have seen him always playing with the above weird vertical posture, but turns out it is not a stylistic choice. He suffers from a condition that makes it painfully impossible to continuously play any other way. They tow around a regular acupuncturist on tours to treat this guy between every show, just so he can pull through up to 120 lives per year. Yet, to him, "pulling through" is the definitely wrong way to put it. He lives for their music, too.

Let us also not forget this guy. At 5'7" and 96 pounds, his inability to gain weight and deliver enough power became an actual problem in recent years as the band's sound increasingly demanded it. The fix? He regularly wears 1kg (2.2 lb) weights on his limbs while he plays. As in, always in the studio, and during every single damned live. Between tours this past November, he was rushed to the ER for stress fractures in his ribs. He said: I can still play. And continued to play they did, until Kyo finally sunk in early 2012.


I repeat: I want to pour forth. I don't demand that I have a conviction in life as absolute as what these men have in what they do. I simply wish I could break my floodgate in self-expression. Since when have I become repressed-by-default to this degree?

There has to be a stronger word than "envy" in this vocabulary.

245. Mineral Show

Jing: Why does this look so edible?
Jimmyn: Scrambled eggs.