I’ve been working through my manga backlog…

Since my books are still over at my old apartment, I’ve had to plan out what I’m reading a bit more. Instead of just randomly grabbing out something, I’ve been selecting long series that I have more then one new volume of that I haven’t read. I tend to buy stuff and then wait until I have two or three new volumes before sitting down to read it. That worked fine when companies were pumping out titles monthly or even a couple months apart. But now it’s getting more common for there to be 4 months or more between a release. By the time I have a couple volumes I’ve forgotten what was going on before. When that happened I tended just to shelve the new volumes until I had a chance to read the series from the beginning and read something new that just came out.

The past month or so, I’ve been taking a series at a time from my old place and bringing it over for a re-read or in some cases a first time read. Possibly the dumbest thing I did was read The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service series right after I moved in the house. A supremely creepy, gory, supernatural horror in an empty house with poor lighting and no furniture… REALLY CLEVER OF ME. I slept even less then I normally do after that. However, I am eagerly awaiting any future volumes because I apparently am a masochist. See also, Ghost Talker's Daydream which I read because I figured I wasn’t sleeping anyway. It’s got a bit too much fan-service to be as creepy and unsettling as Kurosagi, but it still managed to tell a damn scary story. Too bad it seems that Dark Horse has dropped this one. Volume four (of ten) was slated for May 2009, but it’s not even listed in Amazon now.

More recently I caught up on Ouran, and am now caught up with the official English release. I also caught up on Venus in Love a title I never hear anyone talking about, and it's a shame because it's excellent. It's by the author of ZIG*ZAG, and of the two I prefer Venus. The story starts out following the main character Suzuna, as she settles into her first apartment near the school she’ll be attending Koto University. She meets her neighbor Eichi, and his best friend Fukami whom she immediately starts crushing on. Problem is, she has to get in line. Eichi’s been crushing on him since middle school! What starts out as a friendly and sympathetic rivalry (Fukami is completely oblivious to both of their affections) turns into a fun and teasing friendship.

It was nice to read a manga that is not about a fifteen year old for once, though I will admit Suzuna’s personality isn’t too far off from most fifteen-year-old protagonists in your typical shoujo. She unfortunately fits into that “Sweet, slow and clumsy” trope all too well, but she’s not passive enough to really be annoying about it. The only bad thing about catching up is that a new volume just came out. CMX titles (DC Comic’s manga imprint) never have an easy time getting on local bookstore shelves, so I’ll have to order it in… but I promised myself I wouldn’t buy any manga in the month of October (I’m saving to buy a fake Christmas Tree)!

Currently I’m reading Wild Ones, a Yakuza love story. (Kind of.) I really like this series. It’s artwork is slick and pretty. I love the covers and the interior “Five minutes Later” gag covers. The main character Sachie is rapidly working up my list of “Cool Manga Heroines.” She is not the passive shoujo heroine who just wants a prince to take care of her. I love her responses whenever her love interests say the typical tired “I’ll protect you” or “I’d die for you” type of lines. Plus she’s fully capable of kicking ass all on her own, though she does get “saved” more often then I like (especially since it seems unnecessary.)

There is a new volume of Wild Ones out too, further tempting me to break my promise not to buy books.  Plus more Kimi ni Todoke and Skip Beat!! Add to that that Rightstuf is having a 33% sale off on Viz, and Amazon is having a 4-for-3 promotion AND Borders is having a buy 4 get one free promotion. It’s like the universe is converging to get me to break my resolve. It’s not even October 2nd  yet!

Just Got Back from Avenue Q

A good time was had by all. I’d listened to the sound track before, but never seen it performed. I had a pretty good idea what it was going to be like, but I really wasn’t expecting some parts of it. (And I hadn’t even known of the existence of the “Bad Idea Bears” I love them!) The only bad part was that the lyrics weren’t entirely clear. I got the impression that the tech side of the show was not on it’s top form tonight.

I’ve got “Sucks to be You” running in a loop in my head. Only a hearty round of Burger Shop 2 will fix that!

In other news, managed to knock off my three things again today. Drew the below doodles, cleaned and replaced a light fixture (instead of wielding dangerous knives) and posted three days in a row. I think it’s a record!

Mission Accomplished, Day one…

I realized after I posted yesterday that I’d left out a few important details. I complained long and hard about how I was so busy… and then that my solution was to add more stuff to my schedule.

Yeah, that doesn’t make sense. BUT, I did forget to mention that besides all the stuff I had to I’ve been so aimless that I’ve been wasting a ton of time just zoning and accomplishing nothing. Then at the end of the day I’m mad and frustrated that another day passed that I didn’t get a single thing done that I wanted too because I just pissed away my time.

For example yesterday I ate lunch in front of the TV and got caught up in a reality tv show about a pawn shop called “Pawn Kings.” I didn’t like the show, thought the premise was boring and hated most of the cast. I watched four episodes just because I didn’t feel like doing anything I had to do (dishes, laundry, housework). Then I played Burger Shop 2, again. I’ve beaten the game and am trying to get perfect on every level of expert mode. (I cannot get past the damn sumos! Damn them and their triple bacon cheeseburgers with ranch dressing.) Time management games are a guilty addiction, which is ironic because time management is my greatest problem. So I procrastinate doing stuff like that and then wonder why I haven’t gotten anything done. And I get mad at myself for not accomplishing things.

Today I drew a doodle of myself, trying to beat Burger Shop. Today I hung the extra panels for my curtains in the living room and also cleaned up the living room. And with posting this I will have knocked down the third goal, writing something. I’ve made the goals small because I’ve tried this before and failed because I was expecting perfection from my daily goals. This time I’m just sick of being mad at myself for not doing anything, when it’s completely within my control to fix.

Also, a lot of the other things I mentioned… I’m taking a step back and trying to see what I can hand off to others. I’ve got an army of people willing to help me construct buttons (I pay them), so I should hand more of that out. That gives me more time. If I was more pro-active about scheduling my con-stuff (travel, tables, hotel) it wouldn’t feel such a scramble every time a con comes up. I’m also purposely stepping out of a few cons I’d thought about doing this October, November and December to give myself a breather and re-asses my button biz. My website has been languishing and there is a lot of “meant to dos” on the business side there that the constant con schedule has prevented me from doing. Not traveling will give me time to do that… and since that’s all writing I can include it in my “write every day” goal.

Mainly I’m just trying to get back do doing the things I enjoy and want to do first, and let the other stuff take a backseat if it has too instead of the other way around. Otherwise even the stuff I enjoy, like traveling, going to cons and participating in my local club feel like a chore.

Today I managed to do all three things AND had friends over to play Munchkin. And I still have time for a quick game of Burger Shop before bed! (I will get past this level!!) So today I feel accomplished and get to goof off. Tomorrow I’m going to see Avenue Q. I have to figure out what I’m doing on the house tonight I think, so I can do it right away when I get home tomorrow. I’ve been meaning to trim back the carpet scrap that sticks out of the coat closet into the living room for a while now. I should be able to do that before the show with no problem.

Reconnecting and getting back on track!

For a long time now I’ve kind of dropped off the internet. Part of the reason was that I didn’t have internet service, but even before that I’d kind of retreated from a lot of the forums and groups I was involved in. (Even the ones I created like my own website.)

One of the main reasons is that I’ve just been so busy. I’ve been going to about one con a month, which doesn’t sound like a lot… but there is so much planning and prep involved in the room, travel and table arrangements not to mention making the thousands of buttons I take with me that it can really eat up time. Besides the cons, I have a full time job and have gotten involved with a local anime club that’s started to put on quarterly “mini-cons.” I’m on the board of the club so I’ve been really involved. It seemed that every time I turned around I was late on doing something that had to be done IMMEDIATELY. Submit this application to a con, placate this angry customer at work, book this hotel, draw this for club, go do this promotion… So a lot of things I enjoyed, like drawing just to draw, discovering new anime and manga and most especially keeping up with the wide array of friends I have across the globe just kind of dropped off the radar. As did actually moving into my house. I moved into my house in May (after finalizing the purchase in January), and all this activity has kept me from moving the bulk of my belonging from the old apartment to my house. It’s family owned, so there wasn’t a rush… but jeeze… It’s been 9 months and I still have to visit my parents to when I want to read a book or find an art supply. I could have given them a grandchild in that time, I should at least be able to give them back storage space.

Checking in on someone’s facebook or livejournal doesn’t sound like a necessary thing, nor does checking out a new anime or just sketching. But I’ve lost touch with a lot of good friends, and that isn’t good. My day job is suffering, because I’m so tired that my focus isn’t there. I still get everything done there, but I feel like it takes me longer to get things accomplished which makes me feel rushed and annoyed. And my con enjoyment is slipping because my buttons are getting stale… I don’t know the current jokes and memes, because I’m not in the community as much anymore. I don’t mind not being on the bleeding edge, but I miss being able to kibbitz on what this author is doing, and plots on tv shows as they air… It’s really the most fun way to experience an anime, manga or any tv show, it’s just not as much fun when you’re experiencing it in a vacuum.

And I haven’t been writing… something I find extremely stress-relieving and rewarding. It’s also the main way I communicate with people, so it’s been the main reason I’ve lost touch with so many cool and interesting people.

So! What am I going to do about it?

I heard this bit of advice several places… take a calendar and put a goal on it and do it every day. Cross it off, every day. You don’t have to spend a lot of time on the goal, the standard recommendation is 15 minutes, but do it every day. They recommend making the resolution public so you have people who can hold you accountable.

So I’m going to write every day.

I’m going draw every day.

I’m going to do something in my house, every day. 

Today I wrote this blog entry. Today I drew the little sketch in this entry. Today I emptied three boxes of craft items into my craft room. Tomorrow my sketch may only be a smiley face, and I might only make a twitter post (not that I’ve ever tweeted before, but it seems to be where everyone is “at” now) or forum post to write. I may only get rid of some cardboard tomorrow at the house. But I’m going to do something everyday. I’m tired of being upset with myself for not doing it.