so hold on tight and don't look back

 + What's On: The Kids From Yesterday, by My Chemical Romance

I have probably mentioned this before, but let's say it again: I have a Kindle.

Six months ago, you wouldn't catch me dead with an eReader. I was one of those people violently opposed to ebooks. I was sure they'd destroy the publishing world, I didn't understand the appeal of reading books on a screen, and I wondered why anyone would give up the feel of a "real" book. Anytime someone mentioned Kindles or Nooks or what-have-yous, I felt this little bit of acid eating away my chest and I wanted to gnaw people's fingers off.

Well, maybe not that dramatic, but you get the picture.

I don't know what changed my mind. For whatever reason, though, I broke down in July and ordered a Kindle. It showed up July 14^th. I remember because I was getting ready to head to the theater. Some coworkers and I were going to watch Harry Potter 7 back-to-back, one part before midnight, one part after. I had just enough time to charge it before I left the house.

And you know? It's probably the greatest purchase I've ever made.

Since July 14^th I've read 32 novels and 5 short stories, along with a dozen-odd sample chapters, and I have 11 books purchased but as of yet unread. I read four books over Christmas Eve and Christmas. The only reason the number isn't higher than that is because I realized how much money I was spending. I'm going to have to be more careful in 2012, since I left my second job, but I know I'll figure something out.

But anyway, I wanted to share with you some of the best books I read in 2011!

AJATT - The art of throwing away everything to gain everything

(Part 1 was back here somewhere)
 

There's a site out there called AJATT, which I'm sure most other Japanese speakers & language enthusiasts found much faster than I did. It is a really fascinating site, not just for the webmaster's approach or his success but for his overall viewpoint. A lot of what he says can be applied to life in general, not just language studies.

AJATT means All Japanese, All The Time.

What?

No, really. It is what it says. Nothing more, nothing less. All Japanese all the time.

すべて抱きしめて 届けたい未来へ この願いを信じて 歩いてゆくだけ

+ What's On: Gather, Ao to Bin to Kan

I've talked before about my fondness for Japan, but I don't think I've really touched on my love-hate relationship with Japanese language itself. This seems the perfect time to bring it up, since I've rebooted my studies from scratch.

Not counting my college education fees, I have easily spent at least $3000 on Japanese study aids. I have software, textbooks, dictionaries, workbooks, books dedicated solely to particles, books on Japanese slang, business Japanese, novels and children's stories in Japanese, so on and so forth. It's actually pretty pathetic, when you look at everything I've bought, every method and restart I've tried, and realize none of it's done me any good. Two years in Japan and four semesters at university, and I'm still at best an upper beginner.

Why? Couple reasons. First and foremost: I've always been a horrible student. I never learned good study habits. I was always the "Procrastinate, then cram cram cram" kind of child. I did just enough to get by. I don't recommend this to anyone. As time-consuming and aggravating as studying is, imagine graduating from university and realizing you've learned almost nothing. Awesome!

Japanese should have been the exception, right?

夢の中で広がる世界はthe last secret garden

+ What's On: Secret Garden, by Gackt

Let me tell you about one of the greatest weekends of my life.

Years and years ago, when my obsession with Japan was in its earlier stages, when Japan was nothing more than anime and JPOP and "where I was born", I learned of a singer named Gackt, a beautiful man with a god's voice. I listened to his music, understanding not a single word, and loved him. My sister and I talked about learning Japanese, talked about running away to Japan, talked about a perfect life in a perfect place. We would know we were living the dream the day we saw Gackt in concert in Japan.

We were kids; forgive us.

even a blueprint is a gift and a curse

+ What's On: When They Come For Me, Linkin Park

Dudes, I'm not so good at this blogging thing. Twitter's more my style, I guess, since I can fire off random things throughout the day that have no substance whatsoever.

Real-life update:
- Quit the laundromat. (YES) Haven't quit the cafe yet. (Noooo) Now work part-time at a kitchen in a bar a couple nights a week (Yes!)
 - I am also attempting to do p90x. IT HURTS US

On a writing front, things aren't going anywhere fast, but hey, that's life in the publishing industry, right? I'm running out of ideas on who to query with my urban fantasy. Most of my energy these days goes to a new project, a YA urban fantasy set in San Francisco. The story has potential, I think, but it's fighting me every single step of the way. This is a good thing, I think, since it hopefully means less serious issues when I'm revising.

Also, last time I posted (in January!), I said I was trying to overhaul a project. I killed that idea. Here's the thing: I have a love-hate relationship with all my stories, but there's one that means the absolute world to me. Unfortunately it's also the one with the least chance of success. This January I thought I'd do anything to better the odds. I stole the characters from that book and put them in a new one.

Mistake.

I made it only three or four chapters in and then I couldn't stand it anymore. It absolutely broke my heart. If the story ever succeeded and I got The Call from an agent, I think I'd bawl my eyes out knowing I killed a story's soul for the sake of getting published. I'd rather trunk the entire thing as-is than do that. So I put my story back together again piece by piece.

Common sense says to give up on the book, to put it online for friends and anyone to read, to be happy that anyone's reading it at all. But I can't, not yet. If I don't believe in this story, who will?

Anyway, I'm off to finish laundry and get some sleep. 3AM comes way too fast.

would you make it shallow so that I can feel the rain

+ What's on: Gravedigger, by Dave Matthews Band

Oh, lovelies, it's been a while. How have you been?

Life's been kind of crazy here. Still writing, still submitting, still revising and rewriting. Have recently committed to overhauling a very old, very precious story. It's going to be a brutal process and I'm probably going to hate every second, but it will be worth it in the end.

On the RL side of things, I have gone from lots of free time to hardly any at all. Still have my job at the cafe, and I picked up a part-time job at a cafe-laundromat three days a week. 60-70 workweeks are not my friends. In another month or so I'm going to get a third job, and that's when my schedule's going to really get complicated. But, like revisions, it's worth it. I'm determined to pay off my credit cards this year and save up for some future traveling.

Speaking of traveling, K.M. and I are going to Vegas in February. Closest I've been to Vegas is the airport, and that was when I was too young to even play slots on my layover. We're definitely looking forward to getting out of town for a weekend. (Now we just have to figure out who's going to watch our cats while we're gone...)

Ah, the coffee's done brewing. Time to buckle down and figure this story out. See ya~

What you build you lay to waste

+ Listening To: In Pieces, Linkin Park

Oops, it's been a couple weeks. Seems I'm still not very good at this blogging thing.

I do have a small excuse, though - I'm querying a project of mine. Have gotten a dozen-odd No's so far, but also two full requests(!). One full's still outstanding. The other was returned with a no, but also an invitation to either resubmit if I could revise it sufficiently or to keep her in mind with any future projects. Since she's on my list of Top 5 (a list decided by the projects they represent and the outstanding praise authors have for them), you bet I'm revising.

I went through the entire thing again, tweaking conversations and trying to clarify points, then sent a couple choice scenes to my sister, who read the first & third drafts. (Remind me to write a post about my sisters one day. All three of us write.) When that was done, I printed the whole thing off and gave it to roomie K.M. Ruiz to edit. It's her first time reading it, so I'm not sure what she'll think of it. I was a bit leery of asking her for help, because she's up to her eyeballs working on her own books (her debut comes out next spring, so she's working on that and its sequel AND a variety of other future projects). She doesn't have a lot of free time leftover, and I didn't want to distract her from her plotlines. I needed help, though, so when she offered, I was like PLEASE OH GOD PLEASE.

She's working her way through it a couple chapters at a time, so every night this week when I come home, I've got printouts on my desk ready for me to review and fix.

With any luck, it'll be done by the end of next week, and I can re-query Agent A. There's no guarantee she'll say Yes this time, but there's no harm in trying, right? The trick is to get it done and get it back to her before I hear back from Agent B. And if she still says no? Well, I'll have a revised ms to submit to other people.

In the meantime, I've stopped sending out new queries. I know I'm just making the process longer for myself, but I think she's worth the wait. Guess we'll see how it goes.

While I wait, I'm supposed to be working on another project, but I keep bouncing between two different stories. Focus focus focus. Bah.