Red Regent

On an unrelated note, timezones are awful. I made a friend in Hawaii a few days ago, and I just now realized that our timezones are really hard to work with. By the time I wake up at like 10-11 AM in the morning, it's already like 4-5 PM in the afternoon. That means in a given day, I only have, at best, a 5-6 hour window to talk to them. Which is a darn shame because they're cool.

 Android, iOS

 Android, iOS

I miss you guys. All the frequent posters. All the folks I've bumped into. All of you. I only wish I could have told you all how much I love you and appreciate all the things you've said and done with me in my time here. Cheers to Hack, Zorua, Minstrel, Looney, and all the others whose names I've sadly forgotten. I'm sorry for all the bad things I've done, and I miss y'all.

Funny you should mention that. I made a review of the game a few months ago. Here's a copy.

I miss you guys. All the frequent posters. All the folks I've bumped into. All of you. I only wish I could have told you all how much I love you and appreciate all the things you've said and done with me in my time here. Cheers to Hack, Zorua, Minstrel, Looney, and all the others whose names I've sadly forgotten. I'm sorry for all the bad things I've done, and I miss y'all.

I sent this pun to a bunch of people earlier and it made their day, so I hope it'll do the same for all of you:

If there will ever be an EGS Conference or Convention...

can we call it...

A TED TALK?!

My apologies. I keep forgetting this site exists,
So for the last 2 weeks I've been obsessively playing Sunless Sea. It's one of them Roguelike RPG thingies set in an underground environment with more than a few nods and homages to the Lovecraft Mythos. So you know, Go insane, eat you crew and whatnot. What was amusing was what happened a while ago:
While on a return trip on my banged up and barely afloat starter ship the Sea Beggar I was caught in a winter gale. Engine is slowed, and fuel consumption skyrockets. Not a problem since i had plenty of fuel on me at the time. Bad news was I was on my last rations and the nearest port (that I was aware of considering the map was still mostly unexplored) was probably 20 minutes away. It isn't all gloom and doom though; I managed to find a giant jellyfish with a human face on it. Even my peashooter for a main armament on my ship can kill it, and we did and just in time too. The hull was at 4/75, and the crew were starving. I wasn't out of the woods just yet as I got a bad roll and instead of getting rations that I could use, I ended up getting a "Strange Catch". Now Zee life (that is to say the various animals that live in the subterranean ocean called the Zee) isn't necessarily completely inedible but "strange catches" are a 50/50 shot.
My crew were starving, so we'd basically try anything once. I opted to have the crew eat the strange catch in a bid to stave off hunger. So one of my intrepid deckhands puts on her brave-panties and eats it. The game then described what happened next; the strange meat was cooked about as well as we could at the time, she sat down and took the first bite. She paused for a moment, composed herself, courteously excused herself from the table, went below deck, and promptly threw herself into the ship's furnace and burning to death. Her dying words were apparently "Better to die than taste that again!"
What's funny was that immediately after that we ran into some pirates and sank them and managed to get several crates of food, so her "brave" sacrifice ended up for naught. What a typical day in the Zee I guess... 

Veni, vidi, sedi.

This is why Patrick Stewart was knighted.

On another subject:
 

WRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY ! *applies steamroller offscreen*
 
Also yes that will work but I have a few other alternatives, though this one will take a fair bit of legwork. The Aswang Project is an archiving website that focuses on pre-colonial mythology and folklore of the Philippines and has done extensive work in their research; they mix everything from word of mouth of native peoples, a backlog of historical documents written and produced by other archivists from decades of study, and applies geographic, anthropological, and historical context for these things. I'd like you to observe how they disseminate say, a Tikbalang for example.
I really love how they do it because they do it in stages:
1. Preliminaries: Where they tell you what the creature is, it's physical traits, and its most well known mannerisms and attitudes
2. Contextualization: By studying the anthropological and historical background of the home country they begin to piece together the creature from bits and snippets from different time periods and watch it slowly evolve into the horseheaded man-beast that it is today
3. Modern usage: Some of the consultants are also authors of local literature and they give their own examples of how they used the creature in their stories
4. Summary: Where they basically evaluate the historical and cultural significance of it, talk about how modern writers are beginning to see the value of the beast, and what it means for the greater scope of Philippine, Asian, and World Literature as a whole moving forward
I was lucky to come across the site and the links to it and I'm certain you'll find something similar to the site's equivalent for Chinese or Japanese lower mythology (which is what you should concentrate on if you're looking for beasts and monsters), and considering (especially for Japan) how well documented their mythology is, I think it'll be easier for you to track these down.
As a matter of respect and I guess awareness I'd suggest you try to track down the cultural and historical backgrounds of the creatures you'll end up borrowing for your literature. Libraries and other sources are gold mines for this information so best start looking there. Also try to find modern interpretations of them in local media; which I admit will be considerably difficult since there are language barriers, but I'm certain they'll still be found. In fact considering how Japan uses its creatures and iconography so often in anime and manga, I think any of those interpretations will be suitable for the task at hand.

 In my own work in researching these things I've come to the conclusion that to borrow a mythical creature is to take a part of it's culture's identity and history; the Tikbalang wouldn't have a horse's head if not for Hindu influence; it wouldn't be demonized if not for the Spanish and the introduction of Christianity; it wouldn't have the common name of Tikbalang if not for the consolidation and homogenization of the creature in the early 20th century by anthropologists and historians; and nobody would probably care about it today if not for a shift towards indigenous stories and beliefs in the 90s which still resonates until today. You'll notice that those talking points I brought up are a very short summary of my country's history (Pre-Islamic/Pre-Colonial Era, Spanish Colonial Era, American Colonial Era, contemporary era) which is why some people can get understandably angry if these are misused; not only is the creature misrepresented, but also the culture it came from.
Understandably this will take a lot of reading on your part if you're unfamiliar with the culture you're borrowing from, and your [reader's] millage may vary on how good or bad your interpretation is. I personally believe you don't need to have encyclopedic knowledge of the creature and it's background to talk about it but as a matter of respect and to generate real, tangible cultural enrichment, I'd highly advise at least bringing what you know about the creature and it's background up to acknowledge its roots.

WRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY ! *applies steamroller offscreen*
 
Also yes that will work but I have a few other alternatives, though this one will take a fair bit of legwork. The Aswang Project is an archiving website that focuses on pre-colonial mythology and folklore of the Philippines and has done extensive work in their research; they mix everything from word of mouth of native peoples, a backlog of historical documents written and produced by other archivists from decades of study, and applies geographic, anthropological, and historical context for these things. I'd like you to observe how they disseminate say, a Tikbalang for example.
I really love how they do it because they do it in stages:
1. Preliminaries: Where they tell you what the creature is, it's physical traits, and its most well known mannerisms and attitudes
2. Contextualization: By studying the anthropological and historical background of the home country they begin to piece together the creature from bits and snippets from different time periods and watch it slowly evolve into the horseheaded man-beast that it is today
3. Modern usage: Some of the consultants are also authors of local literature and they give their own examples of how they used the creature in their stories
4. Summary: Where they basically evaluate the historical and cultural significance of it, talk about how modern writers are beginning to see the value of the beast, and what it means for the greater scope of Philippine, Asian, and World Literature as a whole moving forward
I was lucky to come across the site and the links to it and I'm certain you'll find something similar to the site's equivalent for Chinese or Japanese lower mythology (which is what you should concentrate on if you're looking for beasts and monsters), and considering (especially for Japan) how well documented their mythology is, I think it'll be easier for you to track these down.
As a matter of respect and I guess awareness I'd suggest you try to track down the cultural and historical backgrounds of the creatures you'll end up borrowing for your literature. Libraries and other sources are gold mines for this information so best start looking there. Also try to find modern interpretations of them in local media; which I admit will be considerably difficult since there are language barriers, but I'm certain they'll still be found. In fact considering how Japan uses its creatures and iconography so often in anime and manga, I think any of those interpretations will be suitable for the task at hand.

 In my own work in researching these things I've come to the conclusion that to borrow a mythical creature is to take a part of it's culture's identity and history; the Tikbalang wouldn't have a horse's head if not for Hindu influence; it wouldn't be demonized if not for the Spanish and the introduction of Christianity; it wouldn't have the common name of Tikbalang if not for the consolidation and homogenization of the creature in the early 20th century by anthropologists and historians; and nobody would probably care about it today if not for a shift towards indigenous stories and beliefs in the 90s which still resonates until today. You'll notice that those talking points I brought up are a very short summary of my country's history (Pre-Islamic/Pre-Colonial Era, Spanish Colonial Era, American Colonial Era, contemporary era) which is why some people can get understandably angry if these are misused; not only is the creature misrepresented, but also the culture it came from.
Understandably this will take a lot of reading on your part if you're unfamiliar with the culture you're borrowing from, and your [reader's] millage may vary on how good or bad your interpretation is. I personally believe you don't need to have encyclopedic knowledge of the creature and it's background to talk about it but as a matter of respect and to generate real, tangible cultural enrichment, I'd highly advise at least bringing what you know about the creature and it's background up to acknowledge its roots.

AD VICTORIAM
If you ask, yes that's me looking at the Camera, and furthermore I'm dressed in Victory Regalia, you can guess why I am dressed like that.

AD VICTORIAM
If you ask, yes that's me looking at the Camera, and furthermore I'm dressed in Victory Regalia, you can guess why I am dressed like that.

Congratulations I hope you get to take a few days off now!

AD VICTORIAM
If you ask, yes that's me looking at the Camera, and furthermore I'm dressed in Victory Regalia, you can guess why I am dressed like that.

Congratz.
Some students graduate Magna Cum Laude.
Some students graduate Summa Cum Laude.
And some graduate.  Thank You Laude.

Does anyone else just feel... sad, at semi-random intervals, for no adequately explained reason?

Two causes come to mind offhand: First, if you haven't been getting much time in the sunshine the past couple of months, then you might have Seasonal Affective Disorder, which is treatable by getting more time in the sun. Second, if this has been ongoing for months or more, you might have signs of Chronic Depression, in which case you may have a biochemical imbalance that you should ask your doctor about.

Loren Wiseman died.

O God, whose mercies cannot be numbered: Accept our prayers on behalf of thy servant Loren, and grant him an entrance into the land of light and joy, in the fellowship of thy saints; through Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

That's udderly ridiculous.

Welcome to my Kingdom.

Thank you for sharing that link. Interesting article, it gave me a good deal to think about, and I am grateful for that. As to not finding a girlfriend, it took me more than thirty years to find one. On the plus side, she turned out to be a really good one and today I am married to her.

*looks at the red fezz*
Anybody claiming this?
No?
*picks up fezz, puts it on*
I have a fezz now, fezzes are cool!

 
 
I wish that people would not publicly speak or write about any subject they do not understand.