My Hands Are Tied

It’s been a while since I posted anything here, but its been a rough few days. Loads of worry and self-loathing creeping up on me. A friend suggested recently that honesty at any cost was the secret to strong relationships, and that it was damaging to hold back the truth just because you’re afraid of hurting people’s feelings. Not only that, but hiding truths from yourself acts as a barrier to self-improvement. Thought-provoking words there, but they don’t make it easier when everything comes crashing down all at once, I can’t sleep, my mind keeps racing about the day’s events, and just making my lunch was a challenge beyond my power.

I won’t even get started on the thing with my parents.

Understandably, this combined with some other engagements I shan’t mention here have made it difficult for me to me to work on anything of substance, or even scribble random ideas for later. I thought the November internet parodies project would keep my work focused as far as this blog, but so far I haven’t gotten a lot done—no work on the meme, my self-righteous rant idea still lacks form, and today I found out that my camera doesn’t have a timer. And fuck, it’s already the 13th.

Work on Carcrash Parker has also slowed since I started devoting more of my mornings to Japanese study (which continues to kick my ass on a daily basis). Finished the first round of revisions on paper a few weeks ago, and have begun to laborious task of transferring those edits to the computer. I’ve been trying to work in more jokes (with Mike’s help, as his ideas lend the script more of the silliness we’re aiming for), more details describing our protagonist’s plight after high school, and expanding a secondary character’s post-college struggles. Have some ideas for more cut scenes to make this work, but dialogue’s never been my strong suit, and it’s hard to fit in much-needed exposition in a way that sounds natural. Thankfully, my friend Sam from Bennington has graciously agreed to draw some Sierra-style cut-scene stills for the game later down the line. Sam’s a talented artist whose illustrations have never failed to impress, and having her onboard adds some much-needed artistic credibility to our project. Plus she likes making fun of Larpers even more than I do.

Apart from the adventure game, my old FWT employer George Packard from the Warner documentary project recently posted one of my observational essays on Japanese life, this one about the hole-in-the-wall vegetable markets tucked away in the back streets of Japan’s aging cities. George’s blog centers around his quest to tend the ultimate garden, with various forays into rural New Hampshire life, and I recommend checking it out if you’re looking for a change of pace.

Finally, I friend recently introduced me to the old “Charisma Man” comic, which, for those not in the know, is an incredibly observational superhero parody about a gaijin English teacher in Japan. I haven’t enjoyed a strip this much since I tore through every collected edition of Matt Groening’s “Life in Hell,” and recommend it to both ex-pats and those still at home. You can read some old strips here and here.

That’s all for now. Probably should try and get some sleep tonight, though who knows if tomorrow will be a productive day by any stretch.

Itterasshai.


Current Mood: Emotionally fragile
Current Music: Cranberries and Lemonheads mix