A List of Things

1. Due to some nonsense with Yahoo, I've deleted my account. If you need to contact me, you can do so through my gmail address: knotmagickknitter (at) gmail

2. Read Recently: Haunted London by Richard Jones
While hardly the end-all-be-all of travel haunting books, this was really fun to read and includes stories of over a hundred haunted places in London. A few I've been to, a few I'd never heard of, and a few I knew more about than was mentioned in the book. If you're into that sort of thing, then it might be nice to pick up before your next trip. Each entry includes a brief overview of both the haunting and the history of the location, as well as it's location on a map and the nearest tube stations.

3. Read Recently: Sailor V manga, vol. 2
If Pacific Rim didn't restart my anime kick, then this definately did. I'm a huge Naoko Takeuchi fan, have been for years. I love her art style and I can't tell you how excited I was when I found out that not only are Sailor V and Sailor Moon getting reprints with all new (better!) translations, but there's going to be a reboot of the Sailor Moon anime starting later this year. So far details are very hush-hush, but I'm stalking a couple of the SM boards and fansites looking for details.

4. Watched Recently: Ripper Street
I love Matthew Macfadyen. He stars in this excellent Victorian-set crime drama (available on Netflix), and if you haven't seen it yet, go find it. It's wonderful. That is all.

5. Currently Watching: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
I watched the first FMA series (most of it) when it was first coming out in the US. My college roommate was completely obsessed with the series, so really it was unavoidable. It was good.

Brotherhood is so much better.

I find myself incapable of watching less than half a dozen episodes in a sitting, and I don't remember the last time I did that with an anime. 

This one is also on Netflix.

6. Caffrey continues to get a workout. Can I just say again how much I love, love, love using a typewriter for outlines? My current outline in progress is top secret, however. I might give a few details next week, if I decide to pursue it. If not, it will go into the file I've started for outlines.

7. Since he's been getting so much use, I'm starting to think that Caffrey needs a bit of a makeover. The grey 70s look just isn't me, and I've got a tube of royal blue acrylic paint that has been sitting unused for some time, not to mention several cans of spraypaint. But that is likely a project for another time, since I STILL haven't pulled out the steampunk typewriter. I've started to three or four times this week, and then gotten distracted by other things. Perhaps over the weekend. We'll see.

8. Lists happen when I am both in a funk and when I'm feeling super creative. For once, it's the later. My brain is going in about a hundred directions at once, and it wants to DO ALL THE THINGS. I'm trying to rein it in with some knitting. It may need to be tied down with something stronger than yarn.

Less than Motivated, and a Detour.

While things hat Chez KnotMagick are slowly returning to normal, I'm still not feeling myself. I've not been very motivated to do anything, but I've still be getting a lot done--lots of cleaning (but still not all of it or even "enough"; I've kind of gone into clean freak mode where every little bit of mess drives me nuts but I can only find the energy to deal with about half of it), and a fair bit of writing. I've been working on an outline for the last two weeks. I'm trying to outline an entire storyline (which will probably encompass 2 books) before I start work on the book itself. I've been handwriting the initial draft while I'm at work with all of my notes and other information, and then coming home to type it up on the Sterling.

I love using the typewriter for outlines, almost as much as I hate using Microsoft word for the same. I particularly hate the 2010 starter version that came on my laptop. It has all of these autoformating options that I can't turn off, and they're usually wrong for whatever I'm working on. The typewriter does exactly what I want, every time.

The outline itself is beginning to look like a novel. I'm only about halfway through and it's already seven pages long (I write pretty detailed outlines).

I did not work on the Steampunk typewriter yesterday the way I had planned to. Hopefully I'll get to it some time this week. Instead, I was working on a quickie knitting project for the house (more on that another day) and marathoning Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood on Netflix.

It appears that going to see Pacific Rim last week triggered something in my brain. Half of the movie is your typical American action flick, but it's mixed with spot-on mecha anime.

If you haven't been here all that long, then you might not have seen my obsessive anime "phase." I started really getting into anime and manga (Japanese animation and comics) in middle and high school. I loved (and still love) just about everything about it: the art, the storytelling style, the music, and the cultural influences. Yeah, I was one of the girls who ran around in cat ears and dropped random Japanese words into conversations with fellow geeks, but it was a lot more than that for me. I studied the culture and history of Japan and the way it affected the art style and storytelling mode to the point that when I wrote a paper on it in college, my teacher accused me of plagarism until I dumped a stack of research, an award winning paper (okay, it was a 4-H award, but still. I was in high school) and a list of character references in her inbox.

She very quickly changed my "F" to an "A" with five extra credit points.

When I started art school, I wanted to be a comic book artist. That eventually got derailed, and then I forced myself to back away from anime completely because I couldn't afford it anymore and I didn't have a powerful enough computer or internet connection for streaming/downloading.

This was about eight years ago. I do still love anime, but I'm so far out of the loop that I'm not even on the map anymore.

Watching Pacific Rim brought all of that back. I started thinking about Gundam Wing and Neon Genesis Evangelion, both of which bear a strong resemblance to Pacific Rim. Then I started thinking about other anime, and my journey down that candy-colored rabbit hole started again. I've been watching it. I've been reading it. I even started sketching a little, and let me tell you what a huge deal that is--I've had so much anxiety regarding my art since art school that I've basically only sketched knitwear designs since then. I'm not doing anything great or intricate or even anything that should ever see the light of day, but it's reminding me a little of why I was so interested in art in the first place. I'm keeping it to myself for the time being. Maybe I'll come out on the other side and just be happy for the break from my every day. Or maybe this rabbit hole is actually a tunnel to Tokyo and it'll spark a renewed passion--It's already giving me way too many ideas. I don't know. But it's a bright spot for me and I'm going to enjoy it. It's been far too long.

Inspiration Shots

What are you watching during NaNoWriMo? Here are a few of my top picks:

Anime:
R.O.D (Read or Die)
R.O.D the TV
Comic Party

Television:
Castle
The Book Group
Copper
Once Upon a Time

Movies:
The Dead Poet's Society
Miss Potter
The Secret of Moonacre

Is there a show/movie that you're finding particularly inspiring? Or do you eschew television altogether in November?

Cat v. Mouse

I had no idea Hermes could dedicate this much attention to anything but sleep. He spent over three hours last night staring at the underside of our fridge because I suspect a mouse was hiding under it. He stared at it so long, in fact, that he forgot to wake me up at 2:30 the way he normally does and I got to sleep until 5:30 (is it wrong for me to hope he doesn't catch the mouse in the near future?). This morning, I didn't even see him until mid-afternoon because he was so busy staring at the underside of the stove. He was like a bookend, he held so still.


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Do you know what this is?

If you guessed the start of my Christmas list, then you're spot on. You see here half a dozen dish clothes waiting for their accompanying hand towels. I have the towels and the sewing on them is mostly done, I just need to make the crocheted hangers.

I finished the second pocket lining for the London Calling sweater. It is cooling off for a few days while I get caught up on the other projects that went to pot during my hell unit, namely on the aforementioned gifts and also on a pair of socks that I started just because I had the urge to knit socks. I've got the heel turned on the first one, just finishing up the gusset shaping. This is the first pair of top-down socks I've ever made, and they're turning out rather well. I always forget how long it takes to knit socks until I actually sit down to knit them. It's taken me seven disks of Gundam Wing to get where I am now, though I think I might have been working on other things through about half of that. And then of course there's disc 5, which has 3 episodes of nothing but rehashing the last four disks, so I normally skip that one.

Speaking of anime, it has been decided that the CFM crew will be at Ohayocon in Columbus at the end of January. We might even be running a panel--we'll see. Anyone else going to be there?

Anime and Manga for Sale

I am currently selling the following series. Unless otherwise marked, they are all the complete and in like-new condition (the only damage you mind find is some yellowing of the manga, but these volumes are in some cases up to ten years old).

I am definitely selling:

Excel Saga (boxed set)
Forbidden Dance (manga)
Absolute Boyfriend (manga)
Bubblegum Crisis
Trinity Blood (volume 1)
Angelic Layer (volume 1)
Inu Yasha movies 1, 2, and 3
Gravitation: Lyrics of Love

I am also considering selling Loveless (manga, vol. 1-8), Megatokyo (manga, 1-5), Azumanga Daioh (manga, complete), Noir, Those Who Hunt Elves (boxed set) and Yami no Matsui (boxed set).

If you are interested in any of these, drop me a line and we can hash out prices and details. I'm thinking $15 for a complete series/boxed set, but the rest is up in the air and I'm willing to negotiate. If you are interested in any of this, please leave a comment with some way that I can contact you.