That Meme Thing

I've been multi-tagged for this by Mynxee and Sarah Conna.

And I'm kinda screwed on the tagging part since everyone else I know has been tagged already, so just no going to bother (this is why doing something like that in a small community is silly).

The Rules:

• Link to the original tagger(s), and list these rules on your blog.
• Share 7 facts about myself in the post - some random, some weird.
• Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs and/or Twitter.

:Seven Facts About Shae:

1. I'm the oldest of three kids in my immediate family, the third-oldest of 16 grandchildren, and the oldest unmarried child in my extended family; cue all my rellies expecting me to settle down and sprog sometime soon :p (but not my parents! \o/)


2. I was trained to be a racing swimmer by the time I was 12, but I wasn't competitive enough to want to join the team. I just loved swimming, and I miss it now.


3. My family are relatively conservative northern Baptists. Because I had nothing else to rebel against when I was a teenager, I went hardline pagan. These days, I consider myself areligious and borderline spiritual: I research about other religions to understand them, I accept that some people need their religion, and let the issue stop there.


4. If you really -- really -- want to put me in a bad mood, leave me in a room with the television on. Most shows annoy me because they seem lame and contrived, and the commercials turn me into a raging anti-society maniac.


5. I've been using Photoshop7 since I first got a ripped copy from a friend in 2001. My current copy is legal (yes! I bought the whole thing, box, manuals, disc and all... for £25 off eBay...)


6. I'm largely a self-taught artist, with only a few techniques learned from Saturday-morning art classes when I was in high school to supplement. I tried to attend a fine-arts academy after I finished high school in 2000, and after six weeks of being told I was drawing a box (The. Same. Goddamn. Box. Six. Bloody. Weeks.) 'wrong' and being sneered at for suggesting that Photoshop is as valid and effective an artistic tool as a paintbrush, I walked out in the middle of a class and never went back.


7. I'm FAR too polite and have a hard time getting out of conversations where the other person won't shut up, even if I'm bored and running late. This includes drunken corpmates on comms at stupid o'clock in the a.m, total strangers who are deliberately trying to offend me, and my relatives when they're being ignorant and closed-minded.

Extra! Because I was tagged twice :p

8. I have an incredibly vivid and active imagination. It's why I write so damn much, why I draw so damn much... and why I don't touch drugs harder than alcohol and caffeine, because I'm deathly afraid of what the contents of my head might do to me.

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On Balance

The trouble with doing art and Eve: I can't do both at the same time.

Unlike my stories and many of my blog posts, which are written during particular classes I have where I can get away with splitting my attention between writing and listening, art consumes a hell of a lot of my biological RAM. While I may have Eve running on the PC and Photoshop open on the Mac beside it (or be sketching manually, for that matter) I can spare little more attention than what is required to keep up with light chatting.

Which is why I got pissed off because an alliance-mate got pissed off at me for not being around to save his ship from destruction on a gate last night. I wasn't even on comms at the time because it was late: I was working afk and had no intention of getting dragged out into runs which could take longer than I can afford (I'm late enough to class because the bloody bus schedules are still iffy due to construction on the route, never mind the all too frequent days I happen to sleep clear through my alarms. Like today).

I really have no defense: if I was serious about my work, I'd have Eve off and be wholly focussed with something I can sing along to running on the sound-system. But I like being able to chat with people; the friends I've made through Eve are as real as the people I hang out with in the pub.

Lesson 1: if you're going to be logged in to idly chat on Eve, use an alt you don't mind people knowing about

Lesson 2: if there's someone logged in who isn't in the fleet or on comms, do not assume they will be there immediately to pull your arse out of the fire

I've been reworking my website in prep for using it as an online portfolio in my search for a job. Alas, this means other non-degree work has to take a passenger seat for a bit: attempting to get a job after I finally finish college is kind of an important priority, even if most of my apps will be going to games-design companies. With a long holiday off from classes coming up at the end of this week, I should hopefully be able to get everything done which needs to be done. And my laptop and tablet will be coming with me on the train down to London for the Bastards meetup this weekend; hopefully I can find a place to plug into the wall so I can get a little more work done on the Hellcats pin-up calendar (the pencil-works are looking fantastic, by the way, and if you want to see a scanned-quality low-res untouched prelim, I could be persuaded to drop you a link for, say, a million ISK...)

I can't tell if I'm joking there. I suppose if Mynxee threatens GBH upon me for that, it's a joke; if not, then the offer stands ;)

In addition to that, my writing style has come around to bite me: rarely do I plot stories out in advance, and Thicker Than Blood is far from being an exception. It's reached the point where I'd damn well better know what's going on, which means I have to sit down, take what I've written so far, the bits of plot I do have already in place and the ending I have planned, and find the clearest possible route using all that as a sort of orienteering map. Hopefully, what already exists won't need to be altered any; but my writing philosophy stands: If it's too good to be changed to better the whole, it wasn't worth writing in the first place. I have the same approach to art. And hopefully, you won't all be disappointed with the results ^_^

In related news: the Hellcats has a corp logo, now. It will be appearing on merch in the Hellcats store (maybe in The Bastards store, too, but that's being discussed still) once I get the high-res version done. It's already appearing on our corp-standardised forum sigs.
Update: now in high-res!

I know I'll be claiming a t-shirt for myself ;D

All Tomorrow's Parties

Laser light, red, blue and violet, stabbed and sliced through the darkness towards me, tracing arcane patterns through the nebulous haze. A deep, rhythmic pulse thrummed in counterpoint below the shriek, settling into my bones and pushing me faster, barely a heartbeat ahead of the lasers.

It was Saturday night in Evati, and I'd found a club to chill out in.

It wasn't too crowded, but there were enough people to let me know the place wasn't considered a dive, either. The beats were heavy and pounding, the melodies grating square-waves, the vocals by turns sensitive and anarchic. Long-haired men in heavy boots and leather trousers stomped in time while women in tight dresses swayed on platform heels strapped up to the knees. Thin ribbons of incence-laden smoke trailed from burners suspended from the high, arched ceiling.

You don't have to change your mind
'Cause you're beautiful
Beautiful
No matter what you say and what you do
Beautiful
Created for a plastic world

I spent half the time dancing to anything that sounded good, whether I could identify it or not, and the other half people-watching, sipping vodka mixers and resting my feet -- it had been a couple months since I'd last worn these boots, and the height of the heels put a lot of pressure under my toes. In order to conceal the line of capsuleer tech running up my back, I'd opted for a short, high-collared purple dress with gold tracery stitched into the gauzy outer sheath; it covered the tattoos I'd had done on my back, which I was a bit disappointed about, but it was a small price to pay for anonymity. It may have looked strange in a room where most people wore black, but I'd been attending clubs like this since I was old enough to get in the door; there's a level of self-confidence you attain through acclimation which allows you to get away with the most outrageous breaks in custom, and as long as you're having fun, nobody else cares.

One thousand milligrams searching for you
Day turns to night
The dawn meets the sun at the sky
I need you to try

While people would dance with me, nobody made any propsitions -- just as well, since I'd have turned them down. A club like this was the sort of place where people went to see and be seen, to enjoy the music, drink and socialise; walking home with a one-night partner was at the bottom of the priority list. At one point I spotted an old friend of mine, Mebrithiel Ju'wien, among the crowd; we caught up a little and danced to a song before she decided that she preferred the harder music being played in the room downstairs and left with a promise to drop me a convo later.

The rain that falls for weeks
Painting pictures on the streets
Twisted stars beneath my feet
I cruise the crowd

It was a good night, four hours of solid music, the deejays swapping off sets behind the control panels like mad scientists over a fiendish creation. By the time the lights came up, I ached from head to toe, had made a few new acquaintances, and caught up on news with Meico and Metus, neither of whom I'd seen for a while. I staggered back to my quarters feeling happily mellow and plugged into alliance comms while I settled down with a cup of hot chocolate and checked messages. That may have been a mistake, since by the time I actually got to bed the daytime lights were coming on in the station, but hey... it's the weekend, right?

We Did Warn You...

We may have paid ME4N a visit with intent to play a little off the station.

They may have decided to return to their base system to roll out the big guns.

We may have laid a little smackdown.

Yarr >=3

And BOOYAH! for my Ninjaperion kicking Annapolis off the station on the second run. Tha's fer jamming me t'other night! Get in!

Unholy Union

Carebears, beware! Tremble in terror, for your worst nightmares have been made flesh and set to stalk among the lawful, consuming ship and pod alike in its march of destruction.

Forged in the abyss of Decon and tempered in the fires of Vitrauze, the Hellcats have come at last to join in a fearsome alliance with The Bastards, that unstoppable force shaped in the crucible of Evati and honed to deadly precision throughout the depths of outlaw space.

May our union be as the burning annihilation of the final apocalypse, and may we leave nought but a wake of destruction in our shadow.

A Summons

I spent the morning and part of the afternoon in my favourite station cafe working on pinup calendar designs, pleased with the results I was getting. Art is such a temperamental hobby: sometimes it's there, sometimes it isn't. Today was proving to be a good day for the Muse, and the flow was pure poetry.

At last the urge to drop into space won out over the draw of painted lines. I finally wandered into the corp office about half-two to find it still dark and the door locked. Mynxee keeps slightly different hours than I do, but she'd obviously not been in since last night. As I keyed up the lights, a blinking icon on the computer caught my attention. A message?

It was encoded for directors only, but Mynxee'd given me access ages ago. I read it twice, frowned thoughtfully, then dropped a message to my CEO.

[Roc Weiler called. See Fwd. Think something suitable can be arranged. Call him back ;)]

Morning Messages

After a late night of tangling with a Southern Cross Alliance gang in nullsec (and what, my dears, were you doing in Warp To Desktop space, hmmm?), I allowed myself a luxurious lie-in this morning, enjoying the warmth and knowing there was nothing I had to do today. I rather missed Chu, but he'd finally been pressured into visiting his family for a week and it was doubtful I'd escape notice from the highsec planetary police for that long.

So I lay there a while, curled up and happy and lulled into a doze from the hum of the station around me. It was much better than yesterday, where a nightmare about being trapped in Yulai in my Taranis with CONCORD on my heels, the gates closed and the stations denying me docking rights, left me hauling myself groggily out of bed at insane o'clock and just going right to work because there was no way I could sleep after that. At last, the quiet grumblings of my caffeine addiction lured me out from under the duvet and into the kitchenette to make my morning coffee. As I waited for the Blessed Liquid to percolate, I fired up the computer and checked my messages.

My old alliance, Atrocitas, had gone to our industrialist mate's defense in wardeccing both the corporations -- hulks r us and Virtual Eclipse Industrial Technology -- who had laid claim to the system they'd been harassing him in. By their own admission, these miners have a reputation for griefing outsiders until they no longer want to stay in Kakki, and Atrox doesn't stand for that sort of highsec wanker nonsense. It warmed my heart to see my old mates, their sec cleaned up and highsec-capable once more, going right back into the habit of griefing the griefers. It's a small-time, unpaid sort of fresh start for them, but it'll be something fun to do while they get back into the swing of mercenary work after nearly a year outside of Empire space.

Normally, I don't bother with the news unless something catches my eye. Today's headline did. 'Mistake Costs Pilot Billions'. These are worth reading, sometimes, if only because you learn not to do what the other guy did. Oh, alright, you also get to laugh about the other guy's stupidity. A quote towards the end snagged in the back of my head, and I found myself saying, 'Wrong!' out loud.

The quote? 'Had the Obelisk been piloted by a BoB pilot, I would have helped him out and given all the items back without blinking ... you pick a side, even if you are not in the Big War.'

Maybe it's just me and the company I associate with, but had it been me nicking the loot, I'd not have given it back no matter which side they were on. Who says you have to pick a side? If I went into their space and they would shoot me without a second thought, then why should I support any of them? I've been shot at by PL, by Goons, by Snigg, BoB, Razor and RA; I've had friendly chats with people from all of them, too. As the saying goes, I'm not prejudiced: I'll shoot anyone, and save a few rare exceptions, it's never personal.

Why is it people feel they have to choose a side? I grumbled. Nobody is wholly in the right or the wrong, ever; what I understand of the conflict is that it's just a massive contest to see who can piss on the other's cake the most while still leaving an edible slice they can swipe afterward. Let them beat each other up until there's nobody left, while we play in their back gardens and steal their pies. It's all good.

Though that could just be because I'd not yet had my morning coffee.