Verba Vita Est

holy moly

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 06:25:15 GMT

Final Fantasy 13 trailer [Youtube; Japanese voices because I didn't like the English language ones as much]. Holy moly. That doesn't even trigger my uncanny valley flinch. I mean, you can tell they're not real--the hair rendering in particular is not quite there (which doesn't surprise me), but man, this is so much better than the elbows in the first movie they did years back.

I don't want to play this! I want to watch someone else play this for me so I can stare in awe. Although I'm worried because I really disliked the scoring--I presume it comes from the game, which implies that I could be subjected to a lot of that. As opposed to PS:T, where I could basically listen to the soundtrack forever. (Really, you do not want to know how often I listen to it.)

[ObMeme]

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 00:52:09 GMT

By way of daedala:
If I came with a warning label, what would it say?

You are either allowed to be brutally honest or totally make stuff up. I'll have fun either way. ^_^

idiosyncratic, I know

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 22:32:28 GMT

Is anyone else done with their Yuletide assignment but freaking terrified that they'll fall over dead or have their computer blow up before they get the upload instructions?

*jitterjitterjitter*

AAAAAAAAAGH

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 20:08:07 GMT

Someday I will understand why it is so ridiculously difficult to figure out how to make a predefined action (in this case one in an extension) go away and leave me alone. But today is not that day. I have looked under: Basic Actions, Rulebooks, Advanced Actions, and Commands. Even under Extensions (waste of time, it's over my head). "Delete action," "remove action," "disable action" return nothing in Search. WTF am I supposed to find this under? Instead and before do not work (the problem hits when the action is halfway parsed, so even a before isn't early enough). The unlisting a rule thing looked promising except actions are not rules? I think? And if it's an extension where do I even find whatever rules apply and would that even let me intercept the damn thing before it produces the bad behavior? And the "understand as new" thing doesn't work either. Seriously, if the code were a place where I could edit it, deleting two lines would solve all my problems and I'd only be losing a functionality that I actively don't want.

Assuming it is possible--and I am positive it is, even if I am having the devil's own time finding it--why couldn't there be a section under whichever Actions chapter called "How to disable an existing action"? I can't be the only newbie who's wanted to do this and has gotten tangled up in all the before/instead/rulebook whatevers.

Maybe I should toss the extension and rewrite that section of code. It'd be moderately annoying but at least it's something I know how to do.

I will ask raif later but I just posted two queries recently and I don't want them to think I'm spamming. (Although they could justifiably think I'm incompetent.)

Okay, off to do Yuletidey things instead. :-(

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 15:23:25 GMT

Happy birthday, cofax7! May your year be full of non-fail, yummy food, and good books and TV. And possibly nighthorses. (Are they called nighthorses? I can't remember.)

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 07:08:45 GMT

You guys have NO IDEA how badly I am tempted to write a Vampire Diaries fanfic IF vignette...
(The only way to learn to code NPCs is to code NPCs...)

For extra fun factor, the game could randomly assign the player to one of the characters. Although that would make it bigger and more annoying to code...

THREAT LEVEL: ELECTROMAGNETIC PUMAS

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 05:55:47 GMT

Carry out and report rules are kicking my spork. I am sure there are sensible and reasonable reasons why making other characters do things on command has to be mind-twistingly convoluted, but in the meantime I am just completely stumped.

And people wondered why my help menu for Moonlit Tower was three times longer than the bloody game. It was because I could work on it when I was completely stuck debugging the bloody garden, which was a nightmare that those metafunction (?? I can't remember what they're called, but basically functions whose outputs are functions [1]) things would have made SO MUCH EASIER. Maybe I7 does them, but anyway, it wants me to write rules a particular way and I am flailing around trying to make sense of the documentation.

[1] I'm sure my Dylan syntax is shot to hell but, e.g., [EDITED]

(define (exponent-function <function>) (y <integer>)
     (function (x <integer>)
          (x^y)))

???

Um. You know: input y; function returns a function that gives you x^y, where the input is x. I KNOW MY SYNTAX IS COMPLETELY WRONG but I don't know where the heck my CS 212 notes are buried in the bins.

(When I learned it it wasn't lambda I don't think, but I can't remember the word, and the only stuff I can find on the web is the horrifyingly ugly syntax they changed to with the semicolons and stuff. I like parentheses. I should just give up and go back to The Little Schemer.)

Meanwhile, to prove what a TOTAL DORK I am, I just downloaded NOODLLE. Who knows if it'll even run anymore. And goodness knows it was so horrifyingly crashy when we used it that it's hard to believe that, as David Liben-Nowell assured me, MacMarlais was even crashier.

Of all my CSy regrets, the biggest is that I will never in five million lifetimes be cool enough to write an old-style-syntax Dylan interpreter. But I washed out of CS for a reason.

IFingIFingIFing

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 02:04:37 GMT

OMG THIS IS THE FIRST TIME I HAVE USED I7'S SKEIN AND IT IS MADE OF AWESOME

*does the dance of joy*

Now if only I7 would quit crashing on me every time I try to use the Contents tab on the left-hand window, which would make navigating my code so much faster/easier.

what does not kill you makes you stronger

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 01:22:45 GMT

Joe: "YAY! I don't have to watch any more Vampire Diaries tonight!"
Me: "I have more TV."
Joe: "Oh, wait. That's right." (Big Bang Theory and Burn Notice on loan, not to mention The Wire.) "I know! I'll make you watch Moonlight."
Me: *smirk* "You're on."
Joe: "AAAAGH YOU CALLED MY BLUFF."
Me: *smirk*
Joe: "Why are your vampire-TV-show-watching powers so much greater than mine?"
Me: "Well, you have to admit this particular superpower is not good for much else..."

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 18:12:06 GMT

Happy birthday, lizard! Even if you can't quite read yet. And I hope you're not on LJ yet.

Moonlight 1.1 "No Such Thing As a Vampire," first nine minutes

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 08:36:45 GMT

I was challenged to watch this! And, um. I can't stand to watch any more. Even if it has Jason Dohring in it. He wasn't doing a very good job anyway. It is totally stilted and boring. I don't think even Angel 1.1 "City of" was this awful in the first 9 minutes.

Also, voiceovers are never good unless Veronica Mars does them.

The Vampire Diaries 1.9-1.10

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 08:03:52 GMT

MY SHOW MY SHOW I LOVE MY NEW SHOW

(Remember: I am the person who has no taste when it comes to vampire TV! Feel free to spork stupid tactics, but do not tell me not to love the show!)

Also, I want to marry Bonnie. Um. Aged up.

OMG THIS SHOW HAS WON MY HEART. I have the data now! Stefan and Damon snarking at each other! Stefan imitatiing Damon! In fact, Stefan can be engaging and lively with anyone but Elena!!!!! Why the heck did they cast those two actors alongside each other? I thought they checked for chemistry if that's the pairing you're doing at the very beginning, for crying out loud.

Bonnie is all kinds of awesome. Emily freaked me out at first but I bet her destruction of the amulet misfired in some fashion and Katherine is coming back or is already back. My initial guess back when that amulet showed up, by the way, was that Katherine's spirit would possess Caroline. Oh well.

The Mayor is, as one would expect, a complete jerk. He's on my hit list. And now we know we Tyler is a jerk. I hope he improves. He is off my hit list, pending improvement. Besides, he draws comics. I can't hate him completely.

Matt/Caroline is kind of sweet. I'm actually surprised by how often this show glancingly does the stupid social awkward thing where people artificially think that their love interest is interested in someone else, but doesn't totally hammer it into my face. Because I hate those kinds of scenes. Since this is vampire high school TV, I expect it to go there, but I do appreciate that it doesn't GO THERE go there.

Have I mentioned that Stefan/Elena is boring like whoa? Crikey.

I think the sheriff would actually make a creditable Crab, even if she's serving an @$$. Her facing down Logan the vampire (ewwh, I didn't like him before he was turned) at the career fair was made of win. In fact, I am very grateful that they cast the sheriff as a woman.

Joe was wondering what chance humans, even in numbers, would ever have against vampires. Insufficient data.

I desperately want the new history teacher not to be evil! Joe's theory is that he is a vampire hunter, which 1.10 seems to bear out; the question is, is he also a vampire? But he seems intelligent enough that he could be cultivating Jenna for the diaries, or the Geiger counter, or who knows what else.

It was blazingly obvious that Elena was going to find Katherine's photograph and run out, which of course had to be intentional. Heh. But she really should have kept the protective necklace! Especially since she KNOWS hostile vampires are real! And that Damon is still around! WHY WHY WHY SO STUPID????? As for the vampire she hit with the car: not Stefan. Highly unlikely to be Damon, who has access to her whenever he wants and doesn't strike me as the type to take that kind of damage just to be dramatic. I think it's Katherine somehow, because it would be narratively unsatisfying for it to be Some Random Passer-by Vampire, but Joe disagrees. He thinks Emily blowing up the crystal worked. (He says Emily doesn't strike him as an incompetent witch, which I do agree with, but I can't think of another sensible possibility.) If the history teacher is a vampire, that might be--but the history teacher staked Logan himself, and I'm not sure why he would turn Logan then stake him. Especially since Logan's return didn't actually seem to be necessary to get him in Jenna's good graces.

I find the number 27 highly suspicious: three cubed, probably numerologically significant. (I think 9's more usual probably, but if you want to scare me with a number of possibly intelligent, organized vampires, more is better, and Joe says 666 would have been difficult, not to mention at that point the humans don't stand a chance.)

Okay, I'm stumped now.

Damon is still evil and therefore on my hit list and why does he have to be so entertaining?

Stefan is smarter than I thought he was. Saving Bonnie wasn't just being nice, it was a strategic decision. Keep the witch alive until she comes into her powers. (Then he might regret it, but until then...)

Oh, final thought: my complaint to Joe was that picking Elena as the female lead was a tactical error because she has nothing to do. But if they are going to kill her off, and either leave her dead and have the actress play Katherine returned, or kill her off and resurrect her (in whatever awful fashion, of course), that changes the game. So I don't know.

Seriously, 1.9 was when this show suddenly snapped into focus for me and became--well, it's probably never going to be great, but I saw a lot of promise. *\o/* My personal hope, although I am not sure they will go there, is that they will keep up the awesome witchy developments with Bonnie and she will be instrumental in defeating the vampires.

So when's the next episode of this already?

I really need an icon now.

ZOMG!!! + Yoonery

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 05:58:24 GMT

You can get Mac OS X's Dictionary.app to IPA at you!!! (I find the standard notation really weird and difficult to read.)

Also, I am never ever again doing ~~I can't tell you or I'd have to kill you because it would give me away on Yuletide, really~~.

Okay, now I get to relax?

Must decide whether to take Tristan Needham's Visual Complex Analysis or some other math book to NY for idle reading. Have decided the Russo is coming no matter what. Contemplating a language, but waffling between Turkish, French (...although I almost never use French for anything), or Ancient Greek (which I bet I'll suck at--I wish I could take a class). And naturally, I expect to end up playing computer games or something instead. But I'll bring a couple seasons of Angel and The Wire S1 just in case. Maybe Burn Notice S2 as well (on loan from sister; I am dead meat if it gets damaged, but I figure if I leave it in California there might be an earthquake--earthquakes are FREAKY AND WRONG, I don't care what you tell me).

Have realized with horror that The Vampire Diaries is now MY SHOW. Stefan won my heart with SPOILER REDACTED in an episode I still haven't finished watching because the lizard woke up and demanded, "Turn off the scary TV."

Tomorrow is the lizard's birthday! Because of logistics we are not getting her her real gift until after we come back from NY. It will be a bike with training wheels. I think I will be very, very cheap and let her paint with my Winsor & Newton inks, which she was eyeing today.

*falls over dead*

[Story] The Godsforge

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 04:55:44 GMT

The Godsforge

For maga_dogg. Prompt: "unsuitable weapon." This may be a little sideways of what you were thinking, but I hope it's all right....Fantasy, G, about 350 words.

The godsforge lies at the center of the earth, and there are as many paths to it as there are ways for steel to break. Some paths pass through caverns where crystals unfed by sunlight glow in unchanging gardens, and fungus feasts on the bones of forgotten heroes. Others have driven people mad with the sourceless sound of water ever dripping in a monotonous beat, or so mazed them with darkness that their useless eyes were sewn shut.

Down, down through the halls of stone came two women and a man. The color of the darkness was the color of their skin. The path they took is not important.

The godsforge was in a cavern densely hung with stalactites. Gaps had been broken into the stalagmites so they could enter. Past supplicants had carved the symbols of their sects and nations into the limestone: two-headed tigers and bird maidens, fish-tailed lions and phoenixes.

The three stepped past the stalagmites and stood before the godsforge. It was hot almost beyond bearing, but they had been selected because they were the bravest and wisest of their people, and they endured.

The first woman held out her offering, a sword with its blade damascened in gold with poetry in her people's abjad. "This sword is our faith," she said. "Let it strengthen our god."

The man held out his offering, a six-flanged mace of watered steel. "This mace is our honor," he said. "Let it strengthen our god."

The second woman held out her offering, a curved dagger whose blade was polished mirror-bright. "This dagger is our truth," she said. "Let it strengthen our god."

A voice came out of the forge like the hammering of iron on iron. "What god would you have me forge for your people of these objects? There is no more suitable weapon than what is in your hearts. Go back to your people and nourish the strength that is already in them."

Leaving the weapons behind, the three returned to their people, empty of hand but better-armed.

Dear anonymice (I think? LJ notifications have been flaky)

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 15:38:54 GMT

Thank you so much for the snowflakes--I love snow, and y'all have really cheered my day!

[ObMeme]

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 15:32:53 GMT

ETA: By way of telophase.

On the twelfth day of Christmas, yhlee sent to me...

Twelve rpgs drumming

Eleven horses piping

Ten btvs a-leaping

Nine arnis composing

Eight swords a-worldbuilding

Seven books a-writing

Six mathematics a-reading

Five ats

Four roleplaying games

Three book reviews

Two constructed languages

...and a viola in a poetry.

HAHAHAHAHA "Five Angel the series"--this meme knows me!

ETA #2: AAAAAAAAAGH I just noticed "seven books a-writing." Way to terrify me out of my skin!

lizard wisdom

Sun, 06 Dec 2009 21:28:25 GMT

Lizard: "Takes a long time to grow up, Daddy. Too long, too long."
Joe: "Yes. Yes, it does."

The Vampire Diaries 1.7-1.8

Sun, 06 Dec 2009 09:07:50 GMT

1. OMG Lexie (sp?)!!! I want to marry her. Except I can't. *sob* Why couldn't this damn show be about Damon and Lexie snarking at each other? WHY WHY WHY?

2. It was astonishing the way Stefan suddenly became animated when he was interacting with Lexie. And we have already seen how he livens up when Damon is around. It is now clear to me that Stefan has NO FUCKING CHEMISTRY with Elena.

3. I feel bad for Caroline. I think Caroline un-messed-with is someone I could like--her "Dungeon-boy" comment to Damon was awesome. But she's screwed in the head. :-( While she had the bad taste to fall for Damon, that's just ordinary bad judgment, not a failing of morals.

4. Vicky, now--once she was vamped, she was a lost cause. Stefan should have had the bloody mercy to STAKE HER ALREADY the moment he knew what had happened to her.

5. They are SO STUPID. They need to do better with the whole coming up with cover stories thing. And they need a plan for getting rid of Damon. Joe points out that Damon basically has Stefan whipped, which, fine. But I don't see why Elena hasn't fled the scene screaming.

6. I still like Matt. He's like one of the few decent people who hasn't done a completely screwed up thing. Like, with Stefan I respect that he has this desire to do the right thing but he has no ability to actually do it right. Because apparently TV writers have it in for me personally and they are trying to punish me by surrounding me with stupid people.

7. You know what I would have done if I were Elena? I would have organized and spread the news and told the internet, and then Sam and Dean would ride to the rescue, and I don't even like Supernatural. I have decided asking Buffy to stop by would actually be a catastrophically idiotic idea: Buffy falls for vampires and it never ends well. This show has vampires. Whereas I do not see Sam or Dean falling for Stefan or Damon.

8. I am about to get blacklisted by half my f'list by saying this, but with the admittedly extremely significant problem that Elena fucking asked fucking Damon to fucking mindwipe her brother, I think I like Elena better than Buffy. I admire Buffy (aside from her completely stupid taste in men) but she's all superheroic and whatever. I can't relate to her at all. I don't think Elena is particularly intelligent--most notably the whole falling for Stefan thing, and the lack of a plan thing--but she's a decent person and she is not a "raging bitch" (like the Elena in the books, come to that) and she cares about people.

9. I should probably cut her some slack, but MINDWIPING PEOPLE NEVER ENDS WELL. Angel could have told Elena that. In fact, I am left with the horrifying conclusion that in any crossover between Angel and this show, Jeremy must be Connor. Right down to the magically transforming into a good student.

10. Aside: It is so good that (other than Drusilla) Buffyverse vampires didn't have mindwipey powers. Could you just imagine Angel? (Not even Angelus, Angel-with-soul. You should never give Angel-with-soul charge of anything that can be abused. All things considered, I would personally think that the best place for him is at the bottom of the Pacific. So in fact Justine and Holtz had the right idea.)

11. Damon is an evil fucking bastard. He is also the funniest person on the show. Goddammit.

12. Although he's getting awful cocky. If I were the Mayor's wife and also Caroline's mom the sheriff, I would be awfully suspicious of someone moving so quickly to be all helpful. I mean, imagine! The forces of evil might be plotting against you while you plot against them!

13. Bonnie = love. Elena/Bonnie = love. (I am not holding my breath, however. Stupid Elena/Stefan canon ship of canon-icity and NO FUCKING CHEMISTRY.)

14. I am done sporking for the night. Fear not, there will be more, to my husband's eternal regret.

ETA: 15. OH!! OH!! I FORGOT THE MOSTEST IMPORTANTEST THING! That last scene where Stefan theoretically had Damon staked and then he blew his advantage? WTF??? Why why why why why so stupid? Why do people in fiction constantly feel the need to make stupid grand gestures like this when they could end the fucking threat by just one swift clean kill? Why? I hate that.

[Story] Steel-Ever-Shining

Sun, 06 Dec 2009 04:59:29 GMT

Steel-Ever-Shining

For daidoji_gisei. Prompt: "middle age." G, about 450 words. I will use the other idea for you for your birthday, I swear!

Tea of roses scented the room where Jeru knelt, head bowed as she spoke her devotions to the saint of steel-ever-shining. As a girl, she had stared at her father's shrine and the beautiful mural of the saint with her long, curly black hair and her flawless dark skin, her unfathomable smile. Her father had caught her one day and cuffed her lightly.

She's beautiful, Jeru said.

You're admiring the wrong thing, her father said bluntly. Of course the artist painted Nyatessa-of-the-Steel to be beautiful. That's what she was paid to do. Look instead at the way Nyatessa holds her blade, the correctness of her stance. If you devote yourself to a saint, do it for the virtue they embody, not the pretty picture.

Jeru prostrated herself and did not get up until he left. Then she spent an hour practicing sword-stances in the shrine.

Her father was an old man now, and she had not seen him in many years. When she had taken the sword-oath, she had left her family behind. She was no longer young herself, although neither had she attained the honor of long years fully lived.

"Sister," a young woman said from the doorway. "I have come as you requested."

Jeru gestured at the tea. "Sit, and drink."

The young woman did. When she had finished, she looked with narrowed eyes at Jeru. "Do you come from one of the other chapters, sister? I feel I have seen you before, but I cannot remember where."

"You will remember me soon enough," Jeru said. "Let us speak of the here-and-now: I am passing down my sword." She held it out.

The young woman accepted it reverently. The scabbard was of plain ebony capped with rose gold. The young woman pulled the blade free exactly three fingerspans, revealing the patterns in the watered steel known as Nyatessa's Chain.

"Forgive me if I am blunt," the young woman said--how like her father, Jeru thought--"but are you certain? Your movements are precise, your posture impeccable. Surely your vigor has not yet begun to fade."

"Age takes us all," Jeru said, "and in time you may find that not all swords are made of steel."

"What sword will you wield next?" the young woman asked.

"Myself," Jeru said, smiling wryly at her younger self. She closed her eyes and murmured a blessing.

When she opened her eyes again, she was the only one in the room, but her other-self was with her always, the inner heart of the steel.

[Fic] Cured (AtS/TVD/Twilight crossover AU crack silliness)

Sat, 05 Dec 2009 20:19:03 GMT

For oyceter. Angel/Vampire Diaries/Twilight crossover AU (Angel S5, unspecified for the others). Angel, Spike, Wesley, Fred, Gunn, Damon Salvatore, Stefan Salvatore, and Edward Cullen. ~700 words, PG-13, total crack silliness.

Angel woke up to a splitting headache and manacles inscribed with crosses. Did I get drunk? he wondered. The crosses' presence made it difficult to think.

"Welcome back," a warm voice said: Fred. She was standing outside the cage in her lab coat, beaming at him.

"Ah, Fred," Angel said, "there seems to be some kind of misunderstanding. I wasn't evil last night." A thought struck him. "If this is about that memo I sent about the proper formatting of reports--"

"He's probably not yet aware of the change," Wesley said, walking into view. He was carrying a tranquilizer gun. Just great.

"What change?" Angel demanded, but before he got an answer, he heard other voices:

"Stefan, you idiot--"

"This wasn't my doing, I swear!"

"Bloody hell!"

And one more: "Who are you and what have you done with Bella?"

There was an awkward silence. "Looks like you're going to have to recalibrate, Fred." Gunn's voice, although Angel couldn't see him. Probably covering the other prisoners.

"Aww, shucks," Fred said. "At least we managed to de-sparkle him."

De-what?

"Fred," Angel said in the very reasonable voice he used when he was about to lose patience completely, "what the hell is going on?"

"We found a cure," Fred said, beaming at him. "By taking the subspace conjugate of the intermediary hormonal complement--"

"Fred, love," Spike said from the next cell over, "be good and translate that into English for us mere immortals?"

The voice who had addressed someone named Stefan said acerbically, "Funny, my heart feels as cold, dead, and uncaring as it's always been."

"Oh, it's not that kind of cure," Fred said. "Really, one doesn't want to mess with the classics on that count."

Angel looked at the manacles, wincing, and thought that he would have to schedule a long chat with Fred on appropriate use of experiments. Especially when they didn't work.

"By analyzing the history of the recent generation of vampires," Fred said, "I determined that a useful first step in damage control would be to remove the overwhelming attraction that high school students have for you. I mean, we all know that never ends well."

"Besides," Gunn said, "aren't you guys ashamed of yourselves? Grown men macking on sweet sixteens?"

Angel was about to make a couple choice retorts that would probably have ensured that he'd never see the outside of the cage when he thought about Buffy. Strangely, there was no love, no lust, only the lukewarm cinders of nostalgia. He didn't even feel outrage for what Fred had done.

"Bella's different." Mr. De-Sparkled again. "Bella's special."

The acerbic voice said, "What idiot made him a vampire? Just stake him and save us the trouble of doing it."

Stefan said, "It's not as if we were any better, you know. It's all over, Damon. How are you going to torment me now?"

"I'll find a way," Damon said, not sounding concerned at all.

"Dru!" Spike said. "I abandoned Dru. My dark goddess, my dove, my--"

"It's not like she can hear you," Angel said. He hoped. "Besides, I thought she cheated on you first?"

Spike groaned. "She only did it to test me."

"Bella!" Mr. De-Sparkled said, as if he, too, could force the object of his desire to hear him over whatever distance.

"I am an alum, you know," Damon was saying to Stefan. "Maybe I'll see if I can find some nice, tasty sorority chicks."

"You could be less heteronormative about this, you know," Stefan said.

"I see someone's been reading up on gender theory," Damon said. "You're wasted on that high school."

Angel looked directly at Fred and said, "I think you'd better keep us locked up until you refine your cure some more."

"BELLA!"

Fred said, deadpan, "You don't know the half of it, Angel. We're still trying to figure out something for the girl vampires."

experiment #2

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:32:00 GMT

Two slots for musical pieces at least 1 minute long (if it runs over, no extra charge--enjoy!), probably 1:30 or so. Give me a 1-2 word prompt. I will deliver the mp3 to you via yousendit, and you can do whatever you like with it so long as I am credited as the composer. Please let me know if you'd like me to post it to LJ for others to enjoy, or if you'd rather keep it for yourself.

Examples of previous work: "Unshadowed," "Ghostfall," "Once Upon a Bird" (all mp3's, right-click or ctrl-click to download).

IMPORTANT NOTE: Unless I can finagle something in my in-laws' basement over the Christmas holiday, I am unlikely to be able to record live instruments (although I'll pack my ocarina and soprano recorder anyway). So count on everything being digital.

First slot: will be done by Feb. 1, 2010. $30. EXCEPTION: if you want it by Christmas, you can ask for this slot but it will cost $50. (I can't take my keyboard to NY, so I will have to accelerate the timetable for all the keyboard input.)

Second slot: will be done by Mar. 1, 2010. $30.

Payment: PayPal to requiescat at cityofveils dot com.

(The achievable desire of my heart this time is an iPod Touch. If I start earning my way toward it now, I might get to own one before they are completely obsolete and have been replaced by HAL. *g*)

[Story] The Mathematician's Blessing

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:18:06 GMT

For armandae. Prompt: "palindromic palomino." Fantasy, PG-13 with implied f/f, ~900 words. (I was going to make it about palindromic primes, but couldn't fit the prime bit in. Sorry!)

The mathematician had had some peculiar guests in her time: astrologer-queens with comet-shaped birthmarks on their faces, sages who spoke a different language every day, blind generals who had never lost a battle. But she had not expected a visitor from the steppes, wearing undyed leather, a shortbow at her back. The visitor appeared to be an unremarkable woman of wiry build, with black hair braided tightly back and deeply tanned skin.

Her horse was another matter. It would have drawn attention anywhere with its tawny coat and silvery pale mane. The mathematician was no equestrian, but even she could appreciate the horse's beauty. She set down the monograph she had been reading and left her library to greet the rider.

The rider dismounted when the mathematician approached. "May the gods of the hearth treat you as kindly as the gods of the road that brought you here," the mathematician said.

The rider had a surprisingly sweet smile, although her eyes were solemn. She was younger than the mathematician had thought, despite her poise in the saddle. "I am honored by your welcome," she said. "But I am not here for a god's blessing, but for yours."

The mathematician stared at her. "You must be mistaken," she said. "I study patterns and abstractions. Blessings are not in my purview."

"That can't be true," the rider said. "You are a shaman of number. And numbers don't lie."

"Even if it is as you say," the mathematician said, "how would such a blessing help you?"

"I have been sent by my clan to earn my adulthood name," the rider said. "We are far-travelers on the steppes, but I said I would go farther yet, and bear word of foreign lands back home." She met the mathematician's eyes squarely. "I know the path the hawk flies, and I have ridden the roads that crisscross the steppes. I know the mountains' faces in every season except the season of death, and I can find water in desolation. But outside my home, I fear I shall become lost, and my soul will never make it back to my clan's spirit banner."

The mathematician said, "You made it safely here, did you not?"

"Nevertheless," said the rider, "I would rather take what precautions I can. Give me a number, a postulate, a proof. Give me something to guide me back home."

"I will find you something," the mathematician said. "But there will be a price."

"Anything but my horse or my name," said the rider.

"Come," the mathematician said. "There is water for your horse, and tea in the library."

In the days that followed, the mathematician introduced her guest to a dozen varieties of tea. The rider liked hers strong to the point of bitterness. In the evenings, the rider sang the songs of her clan while the mathematician pored over her books, seeking what the rider desired.

The rider taught the mathematician how to sit a horse without falling off, although posting at the trot was a disaster. They laughed about it afterward. The rider had soothing hands: clearly she was no stranger to such comforts.

"Fire," the mathematician said during tea one day. "There is no smith here, but you will need one, too."

The rider cocked her head. She had gotten used to the mathematician's habit of speaking mid-thought. After all, in the ordinary course of things, the mathematician lived alone.

"I have a number for you," the mathematician said. She produced a long slip of paper.

"You know I don't read," the rider said. While not entirely true--she could puzzle out the more common words in the region's trade tongue--she was no scholar, either.

"Immaterial," the mathematician said. "Look: this is a number that reads the same from beginning to end, and from end to beginning. All you have to do is match up the numerals."

The rider bent her head and studied the number. Indeed, it was so.

"No matter how far you journey," the mathematician said, "you will always be on your way back home."

The rider's eyes crinkled. "This construction," she said, reaching out to rub the edge of the paper between her fingers. "It wasn't necessary for it to be written in numbers, was it? It could have been a pattern of syllabary symbols or pictures of flowers or anything at all."

"You are too clever for me," the mathematician said. "That is my price: that no matter how far you ride, you come back to visit me before you return to your clan."

"I would have done so in any case," the rider said softly.

The mathematician glanced down.

"Why fire?" the rider asked a while.

"Brand your mount with the number. That way it will bear you safely wherever you go."

"It's a long number," the rider said.

"You have a long road ahead of you," the mathematician said.

The rider left the next morning, without farewell. But on her pillow, the mathematician found the number's pattern arranged in dried flowers and tea leaves and plaited strands from the horse's tail: a promise.

[ObMeme] Holiday wishlist meme

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:24:17 GMT

By way of nestra.

1. Donate to Médecins sans Frontières.

2. AOOO fic feedback: mostly Buffyverse, but also some random crossovers (Buffyverse/The Vampire Diaries) and miscellaneous others (Princess Tutu).

3. Mixes of music that could be good for vidding (Buffyverse; theoretically I could try Veronica Mars S1), or recommendations for artists to try. (If you say Evanescence I will cry. *g*)

4. I have wanted an Angel(us)/Faith bodyswap fic for a very long time. It could be either POV, it could be totally cracky or serious, it could be totally adult-rated (although I have a weak tolerance for gore/violence) or not sexual at all. I swear I have searched Google high and low and I can't seem to turn up anything.

5. I kind of crave a 30-second Angel vidlet: I love them all, but Gunn or Angel or Cordy (seriously, I've made a Cordy vid, but how many of them are there out there?) or ensemble would be really neat.

6. Recommendations for cracktastic vampire manga/manhwa/etc. that don't spork me off. You don't lose points for trying even if I turn out not to like it; I know I can be ridiculously picky about these things.

7. I will never say no to physical notebooks, whether they're Moleskine (which seems to be better for the fountain pen) or the very very cheap ones you find in drugstores or anything in between. I burn through notebooks like whoa.

8. I realize this is such a vanishingly specialized taste that it's not going to happen, but I kind of crave more L5R/Angel crossovers of any kind. (Does this mean that Darla is Bayushi Kachiko?)

9. Books on music theory, film scoring, composition. Used copies are fantastic. (I do have a film scoring book by Kompanek, Piston's Harmony, Chadwick's Harmony, have done the second Berklee theory book--I skipped the first one because it was too basic, Russo's Composing Music, and some other random stuff. But more resources = good.) I am currently very interested in resources specific to video game music composing.

10. Do a gifty thing for someone else. Spread the giftiness!

Feel free to link to your wishlist in comments--I can't do spendy stuff right now, but I can do other things like writing ficlets or making icons or whatnot.

[Story] The Third Flower

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 07:42:53 GMT

For telophase. About 700 words. Rated G, fantasy. Prompt: "secret passages."

At the end of the world was a mountain, and in the hidden heart of the mountain was a maze. At the center of the maze, the stories said, there bloomed a flower. Storytellers from the riverlands said the flower was fair as morning, and shone with its own light. Storytellers from the drylands said the flower had petals dark as shadow, and perfumed the entire maze with the scents of extinct fruits. And storytellers from the mountain itself said the flower was no flower, but the chrysalis of a goddess.

One day a traveler from a far land came to the end of the world. She gazed out over the edge, where the sky bled into an insuperable blackness, unpierced even by starlight. Long ago, she had offended against her general, and he had exiled her to the world's end. He had meant for her to die on the way, but the traveler was skilled with bow and spear, and her foes had fallen before her. Nor did she intend to greet death by flinging herself over the world's edge. But she knew of the tales of the maze, and as there was scant sustenance to be had on the mountain, she would have to seek it within the maze.

Although hunger gnawed at her stomach, she searched until the stone yielded its secrets to her. Trembling, she descended into the maze. A curious pale light the color of pollen illuminated the passageways. Not trusting the light, the traveler closed her eyes. Her footsteps echoed strangely, and so it was that she discovered a door hidden to the eye.

The light grew brighter, so that she saw it as a reddish haze against her eyelids. There was a pattern in the haze: a map in the shape of the convolutions of a flower's petals. The traveler did not trust this either, but her curiosity was piqued. Besides, she was nearing the end of her strength.

Following the map she had been shown, the traveler went deeper and deeper into the mountain. At times she thought she could hear the mountain whispering to her of hoarded bones and rotted ghosts. I am stronger than you, she said to it, and kept putting one foot in front of the other.

She came upon the flower almost without warning. It was fair as morning, and she stopped, struck by its beauty.

Pluck me, it said in a voice like silk and pearls. I offer you the treasures of the world: sapphire cabochons and silver coronets, alabaster sculptures and books of forgotten poetry.

I am but a simple soldier, the traveler said. My spear and bow are all the treasure I need. And she would not touch the flower.

Darkness suffused the flower's petals, and it became even more beautiful than before. Pluck me, it said in a voice like velvet and glass. I offer you the wisdom of the world: knowledge of the rivalries that drive men and women, and understanding of the philosophies that dragons compose during storms; the answer to every riddle ever devised and the questions that even the dead must ask.

I am but a simple soldier, the traveler said. The wisdom I carry is the wisdom of the road. I have no need of yours. And she would not touch the flower.

Then the flower's petals withered and floated free, crumbling to dust when they landed on the floor. All that remained was the rich smell of a hundred unfamiliar fruits.

The traveler looked at the empty stem. In the tales there is one other flower, she said.

You are the flower at the heart of the maze now, said the flower's voice. If you do not desire material treasures or gifts of wisdom, all I can offer is what you brought with you: yourself.

Years later, they say, the general repented of his sentence and sent messengers to the end of the world to find the exile. Although they searched the mountain's every slope, they never found her. They left without ever asking the mountain's humble villagers about the newly built shrine where they left offerings of petals and fruit to an unnamed goddess.

an experiment

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 02:15:06 GMT

The achievable desire of my heart right now is an inexpensive font. So I thought, why not try to earn it? Right now the desire of my brain (other than music theory) is flash fiction/drabbles.

~~Six slots~~ (all taken!) for flash fiction at 100-300 words (it may run a little longer if the story runs away with me, at no extra charge), $6 each, to a 1-2 word prompt of your choosing. Let me know if you want the story done before some special date as long as I have at least a week to deliver (otherwise I will try to have it done before New Year's), and if you want the story sent just to you (otherwise it will be posted to LJ so others can enjoy it too). Original fiction only unless you want something non-canon (?) set in the Paper Souls-iverse. Note that I suck at romancy things at any length, but if you're okay with unintentionally hilarious results, I'll give it a try.

Examples of longer stories online include "Blue Ink" [Clarkesworld] and "Notes on the Necromantic Symphony" [Farrago's Wainscot].

Payment to requiescat@cityofveils.com (PayPal).

1. telophase ~~("secret passages")~~ DONE: The Third Flower
2. armandae ~~("palindromic palomino")~~ DONE: The Mathematician's Blessing
3. daidoji_gisei ~~("middle age")~~ DONE: Steel-Ever-Shining
4. maga_dogg ~~("unsuitable weapon")~~ DONE: The Godsforge
5. dormouse_in_tea ("carousel horses")
6. kate_nepveu ("fierce clarity")