Reileen van Kaile

reileen: Doing NaNo is like finding really crap source material that you can then write really awesome neurotically fleshed-out fanfiction about.
reileen: ...or at least that's one way I'm viewing this process of actually writing original shit. XD
reileen: You can take the fan out of the fandom, but you can never take the fandom out of the fan!

...yeah. For some reason, I can't seem to make the transition to original fiction all that easily, even though some of the stuff I write for my usual fandoms are only a couple of name changes away from being original fiction. So I have to make some sort of connection to writing fanfic in order for me to write original fic. This most likely defeats the purpose of me writing original fic in the first place, but hey, whatever gets the job done, right? :D

Anyway, I finished doing the outline notecards for Glass Houses. I'm not sure what I want to do from here with this thing. I might try to pull together what I've learned about the main characters into a single comprehensive character file, and/or work on a rough map of the relevant areas that would just establish things like "Neliam is north of Thorlith" and stuff like that. Or I could just go back to my fanfiction for a while. *can never seem to concentrate on one project at a time, which is no doubt going to drive her even more crazy in the future*

I'm also working through All You Need to Know About the Music Business by Donald S. Passman. mugging_hipster lent it to me after we had a talk about our dream careers. I'm not even halfway through the book yet, but already I know I'm getting a copy of the latest edition for myself once I get some money. I probably won't even break into the bottom of the muzak biz until my 30's, but I might as well start laying the groundwork now, yeah?

-Reileen
I wore the time like a dress that year

My clueless buttmunch of a brother lost his cell phone (the third one already!) the other day, so Daddykins went out and switched our provider from T-Mobile to AT&T, and got me and Mommykins (and buttmunch) shiny new phones. (Mine's in gold/lime green.) It's a great phone and all, and I still have my same number, but...d00d. I liked my hot pink Motorola Razr, with its Hello Kitty background and its Super Mario Bros ringtone. I have to bring in my new phone to the AT&T store to get it fixed or replaced, though - the battery cover thingy on the back is peeling off and I can't get it to stick. And I may be able to transfer all the information from my Razr (phone numbers and such) over to this Samsung.

***

The awakening of my music muse has, in addition to compelling me to compose, also compelled me to expand my music collection. I managed to get my hands on stuff from the Black-Eyed Peas, Tori Amos, and Within Temptation, among others. WMP is currently playing Shine by Edenbridge, a symphonic metal/neo-classical band from Austria. They're close in sound to Within Temptation, although Sabine Edelsbacher has a slightly lower voice than Sharon den Adel. So far, I like Edenbridge in general, but I haven't yet found a song from them that sticks with me. I'm confident I'll find one, though - they've got some awesome stuff. Probably the closest thing America has to these female-powered symphonic rock bands is Evanescence, which is...well, I'll leave it to others to debate on how close the comparison is and whether it's well-deserved or not. Whatever your opinion on that issue, Evanescence is the band that got me into the genre in the first place, so that's got to account for something. It was my interest in them and my impatience with waiting for their next album (The Open Door hadn't come out yet) that led me to Nightwish (Shanni's boyfriend introduced them to me). After that came Lacuna Coil, although I don't remember how I got into them. But vyctori introduced me to Within Temptation, and thank you for that!

I wonder if there's a Japanese equivalent to Nightwish or Within Temptation? That would be interesting.

And I finally found out that Priscilla Ahn is releasing her first full studio album, A Good Day, on June 11! This heartens me immensely, for I adore Ahn's vocals and have been craving more of them ever since I first got her self-titled EP. In addition, Thrice is coming out with Vols. III & IV of their conceptual work The Alchemy Index on April 15. Nothing official on Metallica's ninth studio album, though, except that it may be released this fall.

-Reileen
that you were not mine to save, that you could not change

I was linked to Face Blind! by Bill Choissier from Faceblind.org, which in turn was linked by Limyaael, who is herself faceblind - meaning that she has great difficulty remembering (and sometimes recognizing) faces. Faceblindness is, in and of itself, an interesting topic (as are many things in this world!), but it holds particular interest for me because one of my novel characters is faceblind.

I don't know why Ryker decided to be faceblind. (I'm talking within my headspace, not within the constraints of the story. One doesn't exactly choose to be faceblind.) It doesn't have much story significance at the moment other than the fact that it keeps things interesting. Considering that he's a mutant who can produce explosives from thin air and who gets kidnapped/forcefully recruited by a secret anti-terrorist organization who puts him to work as one of their top assassins, not being able to recognize faces is certainly going to cause more than its fair share of problems. I also don't know if he was officially diagnosed with it. I do get the sense, however, that in the orphanage Ryker grew up in, he was teased for never being able to remember or recognize the faces of people that he saw every day. The group of unrecognizable faces included that of his best friend Cade, who - despite sometimes feeling hurt that Ryker would never recognize him when they passed within six inches of each other in the hallways - became very protective of Ryker as a result of all the teasing. Cade's aware that Ryker's mind doesn't exactly work right; Ryker knows something's messed, mostly because Cade keeps on pointing it out to him, but he tends to brush it off as nothing even when it causes him major problems. Like not recognizing that it's your boss stomping up to you when you're complaining about him to your co-workers. Or, you know, not recognizing who the hell it is you're supposed to kill on a mission. Talk about the potential collateral damage. Logic would dictate that he should be switched out for someone more normal, but Ryker's a Special Little Snowflake on his side of things. He's a bit essential to this particular organization's mission, so they decide that they'd just figure out how to work with it when they're not busy trying to find a way to fix it - which I guess is why Ryker frequently works in tandem with Yunia, one of the members who originally recruited him.

All of the above is, of course, subject to change at any moment. Ryker's story was my NaNoWriMo 2007 project, and I'm not very happy with how it turned out. Partly because I seem to never figure out how my stories are supposed to turn out: I have this irritating tendency in my writing to be able to set up decent scenarios, but I can never figure out how to truly follow through on them. I'm a horrible story plotter, truly. For the past three NaNoWriMos, I've gotten through by writing as much detail and random stuff as I can with the hope that something will come together at the end, only for me to be left wondering, in Week Four, whether the blue cord is supposed to go there or if that's the spot for the yellow cord, and do I cut the red cord or will that make things go kablamafoo in the worst way possible?

***

Listening to Evanescence's pre-Fallen stuff is both depressing and soothing at the same time. I actually prefer these songs over the ones they released on Fallen and The Open Door. It feels...purer? A couple of these songs ("Solitude", "October", "Forgive Me") have a really nice folksy, nostalgic feel to them. On the other end of the spectrum, "Even In Death" has to be one of their creepiest songs ever, even topping "Snow White Queen" from The Open Door.

***

An awesome quote from the awesome Sarah over at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, regarding the influx of kickass female heroines that have popped up lately:

I know a lot of folks have been complaining about the ever-present flood of vampire heroes - but is anyone tired of the kickass heroine? Generally speaking, if she’s done right, I love love love her and don’t know if I’d ever get tired of heroines who could not only squeeze the hero’s ass but could also hand it to him in a fight.

To be fair, I've seen a couple of folks complain about kickass heroines being too "hardass" - that is, not emotional enough. I don't (want to) think this is so much a sexist notion as it is the effect of possibly bad writing that produces wooden characters, which is what Sarah addresses briefly in the quote. Honestly, I think that having emotions and dealing with them makes a character even more badass and kickass, because the contrast between the two sides is drawn in even starker lines than before. A character who technically kicks ass in a fight but has no emotions is just a fighting machine. And while that's fun to watch for a while, it can get very, very tiring.

On a slight tangent, I've never been a particular fan of the vampire heroes. If When I write my tongue-in-cheek vampire novel, it's going to feature a female character who gets turned by a female vampire, and the two will end up in an on-again, off-again lesbian relationship. Seriously, folks, where are all the lesbian vampiresses? Come on, now!

-Reileen
in our mutual shame, we hide our eyes to blind them from the truth

One of the Top 24 finalists in season 7 of American Idol is 20-year-old Ramiele Malubay, a Filipina-American from Miramar, Florida. She sang Aretha Franklin's "Natural Woman" as her audition, and while she certainly has a big voice for such a small girl, I'm not sure that it's something that necessarily appeals to my musical tastes, or to the tastes of the American masses. She is, however, unbelievably cute liekwhoah. Nevertheless, I'm really happy to see some AA representin' going on, even with (or perhaps because of) the somewhat disastrous appearance of Jasmine Trias in an earlier season of American Idol. I have to agree with Simon when he says that her style is more suited to being a hotel singer, but she has talent and lots of room to grow and improve, and I'd like to see where she goes.

Pinay Pryde what what.

-Reileen
you make me feel like a natural woman

I don't usually watch music videos, but dantaron was doing his media studies homework and got me curious, so I checked out stuff for some of my favorite songs.

Evanescence - Lithium
This was one of my favorite songs off their The Open Door album, so it's a wonder I didn't think to check this out before. Well, come to think of it, I hadn't been impressed by the "Call Me When You're Sober" video, so maybe I just decided to write off the music videos from that. It has a couple of really fast shots, which is jarring for a slow song like this, but I love the setting.




Avenged Sevenfold - Beast and the Harlot
First heard this song on Guitar Hero 2. Yes, really. Shut the fuck up, I like it. And the concept for this video isn't too bad, although the female character threw me for a loop because she looks like Amy Lee from Evanescence. *points up*




Nightwish - Amaranth
From their new album, Dark Passion Play. Apparently the concept is based on a really famous Finnish painting called "The Wounded Angel".




The Offspring - Original Prankster
There's not much to say except "ewww" at the first prank in the video. Also, the song is awesome and the video in general is awesome.




Yousei Teikoku - Kokou no Sousei (live)
o...omg. *sobs* "Kokou no Sousei" is one of my favorite Yousei Teikoku songs evar. So of course when I found a live performance of it, I was shocked! Amazed! Gleeful! Surely a song made of this much awesome would be even better live, right?

Not so, folks.

This Reileen regrets to inform you that Yui Itsuki is one of those seiyuu who really can't sing but is commissioned to do it anyway for commercial reasons. The video is taken off the extras from YT's new "metanoia" album; there are also videos for live performances of "Ira" and "Shijun no Zankoku". The former is actually passable; the latter happens to suck. WRRRYYYYYYY.




It's late as hell even given that my sleeping schedule has relapsed into a more vampiric pattern, but there's no way I can sleep knowing that one of my favorite bands gives a really sucky live performance. I AM RUINED FOREVER DO YOU HEAR ME MARTEL FOREEEVVVEEERRRR.

-Reileen
and in the end, I guess I had to fall

WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT'S ALREADY THE MIDDLE OF DECEMBER?!

...ahem. So I finally got my hands on Vanessa Carlton's Heroes and Thieves (you need not ask how) and after giving it a few listens, I'm finding that I'm liking it better than I did the first time I listened to it on VH1.com. I still wish she'd given studio treatment to "All Is Well", but it looks like she's at least performing the song on her current tour, so that means I can get good live recordings off YouTube.

At first, the absence of any seemingly darker tunes (something along the lines of "Rinse" or "The Wreckage") and the prominence of songs about love and happiness on the album irritated me. (Yes, I know, I'm an emo kid. I'll cheer up soon. Maybe.) But I've become hooked on the title track and "Nolita Fairytale". Unfortunately, the arrangement for "This Time", a song that I was looking forward to after hearing it for the first time a while back, didn't stick with me. It should be also be noted that Vanessa's voice has lost some of the "whine" that it possessed on her first two albums, and it really makes her music sound more mature. It's still there, but I suspect that's just sort of her trademark by now.

Here's the music video for "Nolita Fairytale".

I hate the cold. :(

-Reileen
I feel like I've found some kind of fairytale

I never did go to that Intonation concert from this entry. In my defense, though, I'd really not rather do any performance without at least one rehearsal. I e-mailed the coordinator of the concert asking about a rehearsal time, since I wouldn't know anyone there or where the concert was going to be held, and he never responded, so I didn't want to go and make a total fool of myself. Plus I didn't really know what I wanted to play. Hahahahawhups.

My New Year's schedule has also been shot to shit, although it's been that way for a while. Just another personal case of self-disappointment in the life of Reileen. It's not a surprising development for me.

To top it off, I never sent my conference paper to either of the two possible places that I could have sent it, mainly because I never bothered to finish the "related work" section of my paper. I know I could have, but I just got really lazy and lethargic and depressed. Rrrargh.

In happier news, a friend has introduced me to a slightly more sugary version of Ali Project, called Yousei Teikoku, and I am hopelessly hooked on a couple of their songs (although I think listening to their stuff for too long drains my life energy or something).

***

Current grades:

ART106 - A
JPN102 - B
ANI220 - Expecting an A, but we'll see...
ANI105 - Probably a B?

Blargh. I should've done better.

-Reileen
to skip or not to skip, that is the question

I am totally not worthy to be a pianist.

-Reileen
smooth criminal

This post from dark_christian provides thoughts on how many of the louder Christians nowadays (i.e., those of the televangelist ilk) blaspheme the very doctrine they claim to follow and keep holy. Also, a link to an absolutely beautiful song called "The Word of God" by Catherine Faber (right-click and save to download). Come on, it's free music!*

Excerpt from the lyrics:

High above the mountaintops, where only distance bars
The truth has left its footprints in the dust between the stars
We may watch and study or may shudder and deny
Humans wrote the Bible; God wrote the sky.

-Reileen
did you know you're so beautiful

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*No, I don't condone music pirating at all. Nope. And I certainly never do it. Nevah.