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< Piro >

fredart .....

"ah, fresh spring air..."

Thursday - June 7, 2001

[Piro] - 10:11:00 - [link here]

Ah, nothing like allergy season. Yesterday I actually found myself staying home from work - a fairly rare thing. I'm used to walking around with the addled and somewhat non-functioning gray matter sloshing around inside my head. Intense, throbbing sinus headaches, however, can take me completely out of commission. I don't get them very often, and usually they are pretty mild, but yesterday it felt like Brain-a-zilla was beating on the inside of my head with a rubber mallet to the point i was feeling nauseous and i didn't want to move out of my chair. That's usually a good sign that i should stay home.

I don't know about you, but i'm one of those people who looks at sick days as opportunities to catch up on things. I had work to do on Chapter 1 scripts, friday's comic needed to be started, there were several color drawings that i wanted to start, i needed to finish the character sheets, I wanted to come up with some new shirt designs, I needed to write a rant - perhaps get a few done, etc. It was 9:00am, i had plenty of time to do all sorts of stuff during the day.

The big problem with being the type of person who only stays home from work when he really *IS* sick is that - I really AM sick when i stay home. ^_^ I never seem to grasp the logic that the incapacitation that prevents me from being effective at work during the day is also going to prevent me from doing much of anything else during the day. By the end of my 'sick day' i feel not only guilty because i stayed home from work, but also that i completely wasted a day that could have been put to better use. By the end of the day, i'm feeling somewhat better, but i'm grumpy, out of sorts, and irritated that i didn't get more done during the day.

this is why i hate sick days.

Some people will say, "hell, why don't you just kick back and relax?" The sucky thing about headaches, especially sinus ones, is that relaxing isn't really an option. Headaches come with built-in stress, no matter how much you try to relax. Playing games requires thought, and all that does is make your headache worse, so you can't play anything. Even sitting watching anime isn't really feasible. Reading subtitles when your vision is a little off is not exactly good for headaches.

The best thing you can do - and if you can do this, i envy you - is just shut your brain down and turn yourself off for the day. My brain is hyperactive, it's always going. Even when i'm chilling, i like to be reading or doing something interesting. Head colds are awful because your brain just bitches and moans all day because it's not happy.

I am *so* glad i feel good enough to go to work this morning. ^_^

As everyone can see, we've wrapped up the first 'chapter' of Megatokyo. For tomorrow, i'll post some of my thoughts on the first 128 episodes of MT, and what the future of the strip is. The things that largo and i are doing will, i hope, only improve the strip and make it stronger. It's been a rather remarkable run so far, and it really feels like we are just getting started. I rub my hands together often and chuckle evilly about things... i'm not sure that this is good behavior on my part, but i can't help it. ^^;;

I should also have a very nice sketch to post tomorrow. I did draw a little bit last night, and started this VERY sweet Neverwinter Nights inspired sketch. With some luck, i'll be able to post it Friday afternoon. I might be a little late with tomorrow's strip - I didn't start working on it last night, which is bad - so the strip may not go up till saturday. I will try, however, to get it done.

Oh, one final thing. A lot of people have been comparing Tsubasa's quest to find his childhood sweetheart as a blatant rip or spoof of Love Hina. This isn't really true at all. The concept of Osana Najimi (your childhood love) is so common in anime and games that i'm surprised more people don't realize it. Remember Envelope? These Kasumi is the protagonist's osana najimi in the story and in the game. Sentimental Graffiti (that's Taeko-chan pictured above, a scene from Sentimental Graffiti 2 for Dreamcast) is all about the Osana Najimi concept - in fact, you have twelve girls from your past you can chase. :) So, while there are little bits and pieces of Love Hina (and a half dozen other anime and games) that we spoof, we do try to keep things a little original.

< Dom >

this picture disturbs me...

"Saucer!"

Sunday - June 3, 2001

[Dom] - 00:00:01 - [link here]

I Just got back from A-kon, in Texas. And sorry about not ranting after Anime Central a few weeks ago, but I've been running around since and just now have found the time to rant.

Let me begin by saying this--completely in jest, mind you, so put those flame-throwers away--I have seen the enemy, and he is you.

Other people's con reports have been fairly accurate--I especially like Piro's interpretation of my Vibrating Sheep of Doom. And yes, the Vibrating Sheep was a real stuffed animal. Now let me explain, before you all start wondering about me. I'm weird, but I'm not THAT weird.

See, Piro's always mentioning/complaining that people ask him for cheesecake pics of Kimiko and Erika. And with a MegaTokyo panel at ACen, I feared that a fan or two would get out of hand--thus the idea of the booby prize was born. A pair of velcro gloves was specially made by Natsuki--wool gloves with "I (heart) MT" sewn on the left hand, and "I (heart) (sheep)" on the right.

And thus the search for a suitable stuffed sheep was born. On a day I went costume shopping with Okashina Okashi's Tanzy (Yes, thanks to Natsuki and Ed's fangirl both being carriers of the cosplay disease, I'm a cosplayer now... pray for me) we found the perfect Booby Sheep at a semi-local thrift store. It was an old, dirty little wind-up sheep (note the key in Piro's depiction) with a broken unwinding mechanism. So instead of unwinding slowly, dancing and playing a tinny little tune, it all unwound at once, leading to two possible effects, depending on how far you wound it--a jingle and a twitch, or full-out vibration and a death rattle. And with Ed's video camera (not with Ed behind it, mind you) following me most of the con, you better believe there's some fun footage of me hauling that sheepy around. It took a threat from Piro along the lines of "If you keep that, I'll never let you live it down" to get me to give it away to a deserving fanboy--the one who asked if we had any shirts on us.

Okay, on to the panel itself. See, Piro and I met up a few hours before the panel and were wandering the halls talking about how the hell we were going to fill an hour with our uninteresting spiel. And yes, I was in my Shin Kusanagi Kyo costume at the time. About fifteen minutes before the panel was scheduled to start, Piro and I headed down to the tiny room allotted to MT--and noticed that the halls were lined with people. "Hmm, I wonder what they're lined up for?" And then I flashed back to the day before when I'd gone around asking people in MT shirts (or even costumes) if they were going to the panel. And after a good fifty affirmative answers I was scared, since the room seated about 30...

So anyway, Piro and I wormed our way to the front of the line and a space on the wall after looking in the room. Seeing it semi-full of people, we assumed there was another panel going on, and started talking to people in the halls without them knowing who we were--which is the best way to talk to fans, really, I don't like it when people have nothing to say to me but "MegaTokyo rocks." So Piro and I just asked some basic questions and they answered them honestly, which was cool--and then a friend of mine in the room stepped out and said "Hey, Dom, when're you coming in? Everyone in here's waiting for you."

That's when I started praying for a miracle revocation of the fire code... that room was absolutely _packed_ with people. And I heard reports that there was a cluster of people outside with their ears to the door and going "Sshhh!" to passersby. As Piro mentioned in his rant on the subject, it was pretty awe-inspiring to see this show of support and respect. Especially when that guy in the back of the room yelled "Hey, Piro! YOU DON'T SUCK!" and was greeted with a rousing cheer...

That's all for now, A-kon and cosplay thoughts coming in a future rant...

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