Robert Kelly

I've just got the local electronics store, a Comet, on the phone to me today. I've managed to score my first actual job interview! Right now I'm doing some research, in order to show the recruiters that I am able to take on the job, and I know what kind of animal the store is about. But still, this is my first shot at actually earning myself an actual salary! I have to get ready for it!

And I've also just finished the first season of Babylon 5, after viewing almost one disc every day. I think Londo Mollari is a brilliant character, funny and tragic in places, and I now have a habit of thinking in his voice, partly due to the fact that one of my Nanowrimo novel's characters is partly inspired by Londo. I'm also rather inspired by how the series shows space combat, by mostly adhering to a model of space flight that is reasonably close to real life. so now, alongside me trying to download and watch episodes of SG-1, I'm also waiting for my next payment to get Babylon 5 Season 2 on DVD. Now if only SG-1 were as easy to find on DVD as Babylon 5 is...

Two threads for the Anime Addventure.

• Obnoxious Sentimental Princesses - Yes, I'm still working on this. My envisioning for this story is spreading out so far that it's spanning generations at this point in time. Maybe I could put the sequels in AO3 or fanfic.net...

• The Emperor's Army: The Chosen Men - An offshoot of one of Gorgo's most recent Addventure threads, this time dealing with his favourite whipping boys, the Church of Lum. The current mindset that I have for this Addventure thread is Sharpe's Rifles on another planet.

A novel set in an alternate present where magic and Final Fantasy style summoned creatures exist alongside current day technology. The story follows a mercenary Air Force on a mission assisting a feudal war.

An indie game that I'm planning, using the Unity game maker to develop, based around a return to Starfox-style arcade space shooters, in a very cartoony fashion.

And then there's the TEFL course that I'm currently studying, and the upcoming trip to Japan, where I might just be able to get a job there...

As an anime fan, I still have an interest in a lot of stuff coming from the land of the rising sun. So when fansubbing really took off and anime could be downloaded, I was pretty happy, until I discovered that it coincided with the moe boom, and that a lot of the anime out was mostly shounen, or harem anime based on erotic games.

So, along with there still being a bit of a recession going on, and my apparent inability to do anything but surf the net and eat, I haven't actually been doing much in anime watching. I'm trying to correct this, but I still haven't really cracked into any of the anime DVDs that I bought at Minamicon this past March. Why? I don't know!

ilthit has finished her commission for me, and after I'm done with an essay on postmodernism on film, I should try and force myself to write something. Hopefully I'll be able to actually see through it to the end...

Some time ago I talked about "Urusei Yatsura: the Senior Year", an UY fanfic that's pretty well known to some people for it's epic length and scope that centres on several alien races and civilisations... And turns Ataru from a goofy lecher into a powerful Gary Stu. Well, it turns out that the writer of that infamous series is on the Anime Addventure site, and he's basically doing the same thing with all of the threads that he's writing...

Obnoxious Sentimental Princesses? Ataru becomes a girl, and becomes the most powerful of the Sailor Senshi, Sailor Earth.

The Doctor Is In? Ataru becomes a superhero who can apparently seduce anyone he pleases.

Faking It - Great Guardians? Ataru has the Saikou Jinseijitsu from the "Senior Year" series, which makes him the most powerful person on the planet and a twin sister. Oh, and he becomes a girl, too.

Totally Alone? The entire casts of Ranma 1/2 and UY are killed except for Ataru and Ranma, but they get female clones to act as love interests!

I find it fascinating that almost all of these threads share the same common theme: Ataru or Ranma have their entire personalities changes, so they can leave their previous relationships and rivalries behind and just become better than the canon characters. Basically, they become gigantic Gary Stus all the time, treating most of their canonical friends or enemies with either utter, outright hatred, to the point of several injuring them any chance they get or just plain condescension and looking down on them.

But the one thing I hate about this guy? Endless, endless, endless exposition! In practically all of his posts, people do nothing but sit around and talk. They talking about this, they talk about that... In his latest thread, Great Guardians, they've made mention of what could be a massive antagonist in the shape of the Lum-worshipping Niphentaxians (his own creation), and all we know of them is what the characters say about them. And considering that most of the fight scenes are of them squashing other canon characters, I fear they'd just be targets for the Marty Stus to destroy effortlessly.

The Anime Addventure however, gives readers the ability to write their own episodes to threads written by other people. I have to say, I tempts me quite a bit to rain on this guy's Stu parade...

I'm having another go at the diet thing again. I've been trying my hand at it a bit, and I'm currently about 20 pounds down from when I started. Since I'm going to Japan and my travel agent was concerned I wouldn't be able to fly if an economy seat doesn't fit me, I really have to get serious about it for this week.

This is made a bit difficult because I've just gotten the brief for my resit assignments for uni. Two of them I can handle easily, but the third... A 10 minute audio documentary?! With interviews from contributors?! That, by all intents and purposes, you have to do yourself?! God, that'll put a dent in my holiday plans!

Also, I've learned that Sainsbury's Be Good to Yourself Lasagna isn't all that good to me.

Also, I've put up a few prompts for the femslash100 prompt battle that's been going on. Guess which series I've been putting up prompts for. Or which pairing I've put up prompts for.