Blog

What has happened to the year? I’m not really sure what I’ve done in the last three months. I did NaNoWriMo, and although I didn’t win, writing turns out to be a huge amount of fun and I’m going to keep doing it. Maybe my ~creative energies~ have recharged, or maybe I’m just getting my act together, but I’ve got a lot of ideas lately and I’m drawing again, and getting a start on some other things I’ve been meaning to do in my copious free time.

Endless leisure is still not my favourite situation to be in, though, and so far there’s been no success in the jobsearch. I am doing some German > English (and the other way as soon as my test gets approved) translation on MyGengo, and as usual it’s a lot of fun. Unfortunately the jobs aren’t really pouring in so far; in the last week I’ve done two, one of which was only a sentence long. Made almost $30 on the other one, though, and requested a payout (to make sure it actually works). I hear the experience from the customer side is pretty good, so if you need a translation you should consider them. And consider doing it via this banner, because then I get referral money. ;P

Something that has raised my unemployed spirits is that the library they’ve been building near our flat since before we moved in has finally opened. I still think it looks kind of like an ominous looming spaceship.

The non-fiction section is a little lacking, but the fiction selection is good — they fit a lot more books into that building than it looks like there’s room for — and they have a nicely sized graphic novel section, too, so I’m finally getting around to reading all of those comics people have recommended to me.

The first time I visited last week I took out volumes 1 to 3 of Fables. It’s fairly good so far. The writing seemed a bit stiff to me at first, but I think I’ve gotten more used to it now. They get points for having their ladies drive the plot a lot, but I haven’t been able to really get into any of the characters, and I’m not sure why. They just seem a little obvious to me; it’s like they’ve taken fairy tale characters and turned them into the cast of a soap opera. Or maybe it’s because most of them are rich and US American that I get that vibe. The premise interests me enough to get the next few volumes, though, and maybe when more of the back-story is revealed I’ll become more invested in the characters.

I also got out a few volumes of Hellblazer, which is always fun in a creepy way. (Although the hippies in The Fear Machine annoyed me a lot, for various reasons.) I have no idea of what order they are meant to go in so I just got out two at random. That Wikipedia article probably has the publication order in it, doesn’t it. Maybe I’ll go with that from now on.

What other comics should I check out? I have a long list somewhere from various Eastercon panels, but I am always happy for more, since I know you guys have good taste.