Those $10 LJ coupons? I'm afraid that sending those to people without them asking me to can be seen as rude - yeah, I did that, before I fully understood what those coupons mean. Really, LJ. It would've been better if you, say, give each of us three $5 coupons, so we can give two months of paid accounts to three fellow users.

On December last year I posted a lot of entries and drabbles at lilacfield. Compare that with this December. -_- My excuse is none other than NaNo 2009 and year's end work.

Last night I managed 1,500 words of non-fiction, with the help of caffeine and while watching snatches of Legend of the Condor Heroes 1983. I agree that every Huang Rong actress might have brought some of her own personality into the role, though IMO not so much in the case of Ariel Lin - her cute acts are more like something the director tells her to pull, and her mature Huang Rong is the work of a seasoned actress.

From LJ-dom:
Leave me a comment saying "Resistance is Futile."
I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity
Update your journal with the answers to the questions
Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions

We Indonesians are having a long weekend, thanks to Eid ul Adha, which is today.

I've been having this idea of making posts about writing wuxia but but (insert multiple headdesking here) presumptuous doesn't even begin to cover this.

From here.

Type 1: The perfectionists. These are the people who find it almost impossible to contain their inner editors, who go back and correct spelling and grammar and change words every five minutes, and who frequently have days when they don't write because they want to keep the plot on track because it's important to them that the book makes sense.

Type 2: The people who just write anything, even if it doesn't really make a coherent story, just to get word count. These people ignore the fact that it'll take months to edit and just focus on finishing and getting that 50k or whatever their goal is, and it doesn't worry them that their plot makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

Rokkaku releases an album. Standard upbeat music - I wonder where the songwriters from the early 2000's have gone to?

An important lesson I've learned from NaNo but one that I always forget come December (probably because I'm usually dead by then): People are able to write 2,000 to 3,000 words a day because they're used to writing. They know what they want to do with the next sentence, they know how to keep the characters' personalities consistent, they know what keeps them invested in the story and what doesn't. It really is something you learn from continuous practice and nowhere else.

I feel like re-reading my Michael Ondaatje novels but I'm not even catching up with the new books. orz

The beginning of Anansi Boys is reminiscent of The Silmarillion's. Or maybe that's the whole idea.

I used to have Mark Twain's The Innocents Abroad. Did I give it away? *tries to remember*

These days I know where to get wuxia series, but not older anime series. Which sucks, since I still want to watch Darker Than Black all the way to the end.

Writing softwares like these tend to make me slightly nervous, perhaps because they imply planning and discipline in a greater amount than what I'm willing to tolerate, being a total pantser.

1) Write more. 2) There's this thing called a writer's voice. Hone it. 3) Write even more.

It feels a bit odd watching Legend of the Condor Heroes 1982 in Mandarin dub. [/Eve's adventure in internet-land]
And why is the original DVD so damn expensive?! Almost four times the price of the Heaven Sword Dragon Saber 1986 DVD. Chomp, munch.

The cast of Steven Spielberg's upcoming Tintin movie, oh man. Daniel Craig as Red Rackham? Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock? Preciousss.

A TeniPuri AU fic exchange, huh? *checks out, stares, backs away*

Naruto 458: I just want to say that my love for Sai has no bounds. ♥

My work on the wuxia novel this month got interrupted by me doing the 31_days themeset (my own fault) and two wuxia series. This isn't going to happen again in August. Did you hear that, Legend of the Condor Heroes 2008. (I'm not even crazy about that series)

I tried Dr. Wicked's Write Or Die for the first time tonight, and made it (166 words in 8 minutes - the goal was 150 words in 10 minutes). It was fun, and I might have worked faster if I'd been writing in English. Bahasa Indonesia have such long words.
Maybe one day I'll try doing word wars.

Manga I'm still reading:
Saint Seiya The Lost Canvas: Sasha is making an unexpected move, which might bring another bishounen into the story turn out to be a double-edged sword if she's not careful or fast.
Code:Breaker: Sibling hostility a la Sasuke and Itachi? Or...?

I watched the Star Trek movie. As a movie it's pretty exciting, with an enjoyable cast, but I can clearly see why some of the hardcore Trekkies are disappointed.

Reposting links from my Facebook:
Why the opening is important in a novel.
Short-version trailer for Yitian Dulong Ji/Heaven Sword Dragon Saber 2009, scheduled for release in August or September. The long trailer is here.
Since this is a Zhang Jizhong production:
the dramatic and extravagance levels are bound to be significantly upped;
there will be lots of qinggong, i.e. people flying endlessly over trees, houses, bodies of water, animals, other people, etc.
I'm still not impressed with Ady An as Zhao Min, but Zhang Jizhong usually manages to choose the right actress for the female lead, so I'll just wait and see.

NaNo is still five months away, and I'm already thinking up ideas. I'm only worried that none of the stories would want to stop at 50k.

Strange Horizons, an SFF online magazine, lists the kind of stories they see too often. It can serve as a rough guide, if nothing else.

sea_sff is a community for Southeast Asian SFF fans, and the sister community at DW is fen_at_sea.