Grand Adventure Day 2: Games and Reunion

For some reason, I couldn't sleep past 6am so I got up and established the morning routine I would go through for the next several days: wake up, shower in one of the three shower rooms, brush my teeth at one of the 2 rooms with sinks, change my clothes while lying down in my bunk, walk up the hill to the Family Mart to buy onigiri and coffee, play PokemonGo (2 gyms and at least one stop just on that short hill), and eat my konbini breakfast at the bar counter while reading or just staring at the business folk smoking in the smoking area outside. Oh, I forgot to mention, I gave in and rented a portable wifi thing from the hostel for 500yen a day so I got my Pokemon back! and I guess I was able to communicate with the group again. But Pokemon! Definitely the more important of the two.

That morning, Jacob and I walked around Akihabara which didn't look like it changed much since the last time I visited (less kebab stands, I think). Visited the Don Quijote to pick up last minute stuff and wander the aisles. I got nose strips for the snoring. Jacob would later show me and Ben a recording of my snoring from the night before which was surprisingly loud. So those were important. We went to a couple arcades to play video games. If you've been to Akihabara, you know there are way more than "a couple" of arcades. I still suck at fighting games and I'm terrible at rhythm games. That being said, those are the games I ended up playing. The rhythm games were surprisingly fun (usually I just get frustrated and give up). Plus I got to watch some Japanese kids play who were much, much better than me.

picture from Jacob

Here's a picture of one of them, it kind of played like a sit-down version of Guitar Hero with buttons and levers. From what I understood of the video cut-scenes, the storyline involved three high school-aged girls in a band who are trying to fight a witch, I think (my Japanese is non-existent). There was also another one with a circular screen that Jacob played involving touching circles and tracing lines across the screen to a particular song (this would make more sense if I had a video). We saw some kids bringing out their own mittens so their fingers ran smoothly across the screen.

We wandered so far out of the tourist area that we ended up in a business-looking district with business-looking people and not a tourist around. We grabbed lunch at a food truck with other business suits lined up. It was one of the few times I was forced to use what little Japanese I could remember, mostly because Jacob told/forced me to do so. I may have just pointed at a picture. Literally, we were the only people I saw not in business attire and definitely the only people who did not belong there. I'm not even sure what I ate, and sadly I didn't take a picture of it.

After lunch, we followed my PokemonGo map to a HUGE Giratina raid. And by HUGE, I mean it was the largest raid I've ever been a part of. We turned a corner and saw people packed together and setting up to play on all 4 corners of the intersection waiting for the raid to start. We filled the sidewalk, leaving barely any room for anyone to walk by. For those of you who still play, I'm not sure how you do raids, but one of my rules is NOT to interact with people. Yeah, I get it, it's a group thing and we need to work together, but I'd rather jump into the battle, then scamper off back to my car once it's over. Jacob, however is not me, and upon seeing that this was a group endeavor decided to make this feel like a team moment by encouraging the group. "Mina-san! Ganbare!" And as much as I wanted him to stop drawing attention to us, at the same time it was still entertaining to watch him do it. With that many people at the raid though, the Giratina went down quick. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to catch it.

We wandered around more before heading back to the hostel to rest up for the night. On the way back, we came across a few people standing around in a loose circle. I checked my phone and found another Giratina raid that was about to start. This one was smaller, our group I mean, with less than 10 of us standing around in a loose sort-of circle. The Giratina took longer to take down but it was the one I managed to catch. Jacob and I hung out at the hostel for a while more afterward. Eventually Ben also showed up in the bunk below mine.

Finally it was time for the main event: NOMIHOUDAI! PLUME REUNION! The three of us walked down the street to the hotpot restaurant (if you're wondering, no I don't remember the name).

The first of many group pics I will steal from Facebook

It's funny. As I'm basically just rewriting these stories from the journal I tried to keep of the trip, I came across this specific part and apparently I tried to write out the names of everyone who was there that night. Past-Alan instead gave me a short-list (less than half the people in this picture) then literally just wrote, "I'm too hungover right now to remember their names, there's probably more but my head is still killing me from Saturday night. I'll just look at a picture to figure it out." And the biggest issue I have when I look at this picture is I'm sitting somewhere I don't belong: in the middle of the table. I shouldn't be in the middle of anything. I belong relegated to the sidelines to bother the least amount of people. Anyways, the food was good, I guess. I mostly just remember drinking whiskey highballs all night and moving around the table to joke and catch up with as many people as would tolerate my presence. It was fun and really cool to see all of these people again, especially altogether in the same place, something I had doubts would actually happen though I really hoped it would. Obviously it sucks that not everyone could make it, but just to have this many people is pretty amazing. After dinner, some of us headed to a nearby karaoke place to drink more and sing. I mostly remember that I must not have gotten too drunk this night as I distinctly remember participating in a bunch of Taylor Swift songs and "Enter Sandman." I'm assuming we also did some Disney songs and a lot of emo songs from my high school days, but I could be wrong about that. After karaoke, we hung out at Shibuya station for a bit until it started raining then Ben, Jacob and I headed back to the hostel while everyone else got onto the train back to their ... wherever they were staying. It was definitely one of the positives about staying at that particular hostel, I felt that we were right in the middle of everything.

Grand Adventure Day 1: Bearing

I know, I know, I've been lazy and I really should've started this a year ago. But it's 19 days which turns into 19 posts which is more than I manage to write in a year. I don't know, maybe I'll skip the boring days but then that might throw off the continuity (I'll figure it out). Plus, it's all really intimidating when I haven't written anything for as long as I have.

Anyways, let's get this damn marathon started. I was up until 2:30am doing last minute packing and other dumb stuff, like updating my iPod playlists and finishing that post about the trip. Somehow I managed to fall asleep only to be awoken almost immediately by my dad who agreed to drop me off at the airport before his deliveries that morning. I got to the airport at about 6:30am for a 10:00am flight which is great because I don't ... move that early in the morning. I bought a coffee and muffin at the airport and for the next hour and a half, I parked myself in a seat right between two pokestops that some unknown person decided to continuously drop lures onto.

Eventually though, I needed to scout for an outlet closer to the terminal as PokemonGo tends to drain my battery quickly these days. In typical Alan-fashion, the one I found was sort-of broken as I couldn't move the cord too much or it would shift the plug and stop charging. I think I just spent the rest of the time either reading or trying to write a new story. Obviously that didn't go as planned or I would have more stories by now. I did, however, find a bunch of things wrong with the stories I was writing so I guess it wasn't a total loss. With a year to look back on that, yeah it was a loss as I hadn't gone back to fix any of them.

The plane ride was normal. You've been on a plane, you know how it goes. I sat down, they served some shitty food, I got up and walked around the aisle a couple times. I caught up on A.P. Bio and rewatched Ocean's 8. I planned on writing on the plane, but they turned off the lights and I couldn't find that mini flashlight I packed. I fought hard against taking a nap, stupidly thinking that this would throw off my sleep schedule, completely forgetting I was landing in the afternoon and, perhaps, it would be good to have some of that extra energy. Anyways, bad decision.

Once we landed in Narita, I wasn't sure where to go, but luckily I'm a very good sheep and followed the crowds until I retrieved my bag. I mooched off the free airport wifi to get caught up with my texts, Messenger, Line, and PokemonGo (I think I might hang out in airports just to play). Also, by this point I didn't realize my phone wasn't going to work as well as I hoped - that full realization would happen later that night at the worst possible time. So, I'm at the airport trying to figure how to get to Shibuya. I ultimately decided on the train, over-confidently thinking, "Yeah, I've ridden the train before, I know how this goes", though the airport bus looked really, really enticing. I bought a ticket onto the Local train (because I stood for 2 hours with my luggage when I did this ride 10 years ago) but when I found out it wouldn't arrive for another hour, I said fuck that, and upgraded to the Narita Express train. Plus, I remembered from 10 years ago how much I hated standing in the train while making sure my luggage didn't topple over. Luckily, I had yen to pay to change my ticket. Then I got on the train and stared out the window for an eternity (probably closer to an hour, hour and a half?) trying to remember what it was like when I was here 10 years ago.

I wandered around Shibuya station for a bit looking for the correct bus terminal, which isn't necessarily a problem except that I was still lugging my backpack and duffel bag. After a quick bus ride I made it to the Wise Owl Hostel. From the outside, the first floor had a bar with a couple tables, and a check-in counter. It looked more like a cafe than a hostel. The upper floors were the sleeping bunks: just giant rooms with about 50 bunks beds per floor, the beds separated with wooden boards and curtains to provide a sense of privacy for each bunk, each floor with showers and toilets and sinks. I'm also glad I didn't pack an actual suitcase or my larger duffel bag since I slept with all my stuff piled on my bed. Seriously, I need to learn to pack lighter. They set up Jacob and I across from each other on top bunks, and that's where I found Jacob who arrived in Japan the day before and Shibuya earlier that day. I feel like the next thing I did was take a nap, and a much needed shower.

With the hostel's free wifi, we managed to contact Chris who also happened to be in Japan at the same time, and we agreed to meet at the Hachiko statue and find someplace for dinner. Before heading over, I tried to play PokemonGo for a bit (either a tier one or two raid), but then as we got outside the hostel, I realized my phone wasn't connecting to ... well anything. Ugh, it was horrible. I guess it's also bad that I felt so disconnected, and wouldn't be able to contact anyone as quickly and on-demand as I was used to doing. But really, I was sad about not being able to play. Well, since I couldn't play, the two of us headed down to the Hachiko statue and met up with Chris. Then we wandered around Shibuya for a while until we found an izakaya to eat at. I felt like we walked for a while looking for a particular one, but I really can't remember too much about it. I also forgot to write down what we ate and obviously take pictures (people like pictures of food, right), I'm guessing chicken skewers, beef maybe, and a beer I guess (my notes are terrible).

We must've wandered around Shibuya for a while after that before saying goodbye to Chris and heading back to the hostel. We bought a beer at the ... Family Mart I guess since that's the closest konbini to the hostel ... and drank outside the hostel in the smoking area. That was a new thing for me, not the public drinking (I could do that 10 years ago) but the designated smoking areas. I mostly remember people smoking wherever but now they actually go to the areas. Or maybe I was more of an asshole 10 years ago. It says here that when we got back inside, I tried to read a bit of the Jack Reacher book I brought but then just ended up falling asleep. Oh, but I know for sure that I forgot to take pictures. Yeah, I'm not good at remembering that, as you'll see in the rest of these posts (hope you have a good imagination, or were there and just like reading about me describing things poorly and remembering them as if I've got early dementia).




The rest of this doesn't concern the trip, so you can skip it and wait until tomorrow when I'll have Day 2 posted. So, if you read the first Grand Adventure post until the end, are someone I bitch to about my writing problems (I'm sorry), or are an ardent follower of this blog (get a new hobby) you'll know that I've been having some problems writing. No, I'm not sure what it is. Maybe I'm just not writing what I want to write. Maybe I'm just lazy. It's probably one of those things that I have to find a way to work through or just give up on. Either way, it's a thing that's going on. Originally, I meant to write these as soon as I got back, but then it felt like I only wanted to write them because I knew people would read them, which is a stupid concern but a very real one I have (but that's an issue for another time). So, I decided that I would post at least one original story before heading into these. Then I couldn't finish anything that I liked and stalled out on a lot (I'm up to almost a half dozen or so unfinished stuff that I still feel have potential to be just a little worse than decent). By then it felt like it was too late to write these for this blog so I decided not to write them and keep trudging through the other stuff. But then I remembered my Grandma asking when I was going to write the stories from my trip because for some odd reason she likes reading these (I'm guessing because she gets to hear me tell a story without actually having to listen to my voice ... or see my face). And when Grandma asks you to do something, you really should do it. She's the closest in your family to becoming a vengeful spirit and haunting you for the rest of your life. As I write that, now I'm not sure if Grandma enjoys my jokes about death... either way it's fine as I'm definitely in the top 13 of her favorite grandchildren. And I know what some of you are thinking, "Alan, there's only 13 of you," and even more of you are thinking, "I still wouldn't rate you that high." Then I got into a discussion on writer's block and figured that maybe some of it was from keeping all of this stuck in my head so now here we are with all of these days written out. And now we are even further out since I just let them sit unpublished for months, 18 posts just sitting here. So I figured I might as well get them finished up and posted already. And now that we're 1 year to the day, well, now is as good a time as any to get these out of the way.

Zombie story

I strolled casually through the spoils of my herd's latest hunt, surveying our kills and some potential new recruits. They came across a small group of hikers, about a dozen or so at a campsite late at night. I had them probe the campsite's defenses with a couple of our newer members, "Shamblers" I like to call them. I watched them stumble like drunks into the tents, illuminated by the single campfire, searching for the living. First came the shouts of confusion. Then came the screams and cries. When the screams were joined by nothing more than the confident swings of hatchets crushing skulls and the occasional twang of a bowstring punctuated by an arrow impacting grey matter, I sent in the rest of the herd.

It's a common belief that we zombies are nothing more than the walking dead: mindless feeding machines trudging along until we happen across our next meal. While that does describe a good ninety percent of us, it doesn't take into account the other terrifying ten percent. As the rest of the herd stumbled closer and the living prepared for our wall of bodies marching toward them, nothing could prepare them for our Stalkers. We constantly feed to maintain our constantly decaying bodies. The dead aren't meant to walk this land, and thus we need to go to some extraordinary lengths to keep our bodies from falling apart. So we feed and feed and feed. However, when we've fed more than what we need to replace what's been lost, it turns the excess to strengthening our current forms. Eating excess muscle will make a body stronger. Eating excess lungs will provide more stamina. Eating excess hearts will give a body more energy. These were our Stalkers.

From the herd our Stalkers burst forth, surprising the campers and tearing through their line. Without a brain to limit the capabilities of their bodies, they were basically superhuman. I had six within my herd and within a heartbeat, there were six hikers dead before they even had a chance to raise their weapons. Distracted, the surviving hikers panicked and my oncoming herd took them to the ground easily.

I spotted a body twitching, its owner still clinging to life, mouth gaping, unclear if he was trying to gasp for air or scream. It made no difference to me. Several zombies were already on him, pulling at limbs and tearing into his midsection, the soft, easy spots. I shoved two aside and made my way to the skull. I grabbed a rock and delivered glancing blows to the head, attempting to break open the skull while still leaving the brain intact and its owner marginally alive. Finally, I was rewarded with a small fracture. I used my fingers to crack the skull open further and then the rock again as a lever to finish prying it open.

The first time I ate a brain, it was from a corpse dead for a couple minutes but not yet turned into one of the herd. I felt a jolt to my system, like a single neuron firing in an otherwise dead machine. The next time we descended upon our screaming, struggling prey, I made sure to go after the head first before the screaming stopped. It went against all of my instincts. After all, the belly is so much softer and easier and juicier to get into. I did it though, and I was not disappointed. Eating the brain seemed to awaken more of who I used to be. At first I was horrified by the things I'd done. After a time, I accepted my new reality. After several more brains, I began to formulate a plan for my survival.

After finishing a brain or two at the campsite to maintain my intelligence, I found the biggest body of all the campers. I called over my lieutenants, two others I've entrusted with my brain-eating secret. We gathered around it along with the Stalkers, already feasting. Around us, the Shamblers munched on the other corpses. "Any issues?" I asked as I always do after a kill.

"No problems at all. We lost just over a dozen Shamblers, but nothing we won't be able to replace within the next two or three hunts, depending upon how many more campers are left in these woods," replied Curtis before biting into an arm. I could see that there was more on his mind so I stared at him until he started talking again. "I say it every time, but we can overrun the Breathers. We are stronger, faster, smarter. It will be easy."

"Delusions of grandeur," I mumbled, cracking a femur in half and sucking out the marrow. Curtis growled at me. Several heads turned to face us for a second before going back to feeding. The rest of the heads never even looked up from their meal. "Your entire grandiose plan of overthrowing the living is a pipe dream." I looked to my other lieutenant and the Stalkers around our corpse. "I propose instead that Curtis get all the brains from the next kill just so he can see how stupid his plan really is."

Curtis shoved me and I went tumbling backwards. I stood up and dusted myself off, a useless habit as I was perpetually covered in filth not to mention the constantly rotting flesh. I was regretting my choice of making Curtis one of my lieutenants, a problem I would need to deal with sooner rather than later. "Taking out The Breathers by force won't work, not yet. We don't have the numbers yet to overrun them. We need to keep them in fear of the Shamblers and not let them know about us or the Stalkers until it is too late for them to do anything about it. If they discover us and start killing us en masse, we'll need to start rationing the brains. After all, eating one ensures one less body to join the herd."

Curtis abandoned the corpse and moved toward me. I could feel the tension grow as this might ultimately come down to a fight for control of the herd. Before either of us could make a move though, gunfire erupted from the trees, muzzle flashes bursting like supernovas in the midnight darkness. I watched the herd drop to the dirt, heads exploding and chest cavities erupting. Rifles clicked empty when Curtis ran into the darkness toward the rifles. First came one scream, then another. Curtis was not as fast or strong as our other Stalkers but he was still faster and stronger than a living body. I heard empty magazines release and new magazines lock-in before the empty ones hit the ground. Gunfire started again, but they would be lucky to hit him, having only returned the rest of my herd to the ground with the element of surprise.

Unlike Curtis though, I was a survivor. I didn't have the same kind of pride that he did when it came to being one of the herd, one of the undead. I didn't care about surviving a battle only to die in the next. I wanted to live. I sprinted into the trees to find Curtis tearing into a soldier with his bare hands. I pounced. He turned in time to see me in the air and raised his arms to catch me. Curtis probably feasted on more muscle in his time as one of the undead than I had, but I definitely ate more of the brains. I raised the two halves of the femur and pierced them through his palms, driving his arms away from his body and pinning them to the ground. I pulled another sharpened bone from my belt and stabbed him through the eye and up into his brain. I just shook my head. Always doing things with his bare hands, I thought, when even monkeys are known to use tools.

I stood up and raised my empty hands. Slowly I turned, smiling, which was probably a bad idea considering the rotting flesh and the blood, both wet and dry, staining myself and my tattered clothing. Not to mention the smell coming off of me.

"Sir, should we shoot it?" said one of the soldiers.

"I don't know," another responded, "I'm not even sure what it is."

"I wouldn't," I said, adding my own voice to the discussion. "My name is Frank and I'm sure you've got superiors that would be very interested to talk to someone like me."

It's been a really, really long time since I've written published anything here. I did fall off for awhile, but I haven't fully stopped writing as evidenced by the dozens or so draft posts and half finished stories littering my notebooks. Recently a couple of my friends starting putting up creative things they've been working on, so that inspired me to quit procrastinating and start working with this thing again. I'll probably do another rambling useless post later about what it's like to start writing again after a such a long time. For this story, I got the prompt from Reddit, "Zombies are real, but they aren't what people usually think..." (I don't feel like typing it all out). Zombie stories... I feel like I'm supposed to say something about zombie stories. There's so many, and so many types. I was just reading Monster Hunter International (reminding me, I should really do those reading list posts again) and they covered a whole bunch of undead-type monsters. I tried to clean it up a bit from what I originally posted on Reddit. I still couldn't really figure out an ending I'm happy with, besides those guys shooting him dead. There's been a bunch of these horror-type prompts recently, so hopefully in the theme of Halloween I can write a couple more of them.

Books of 2018: Quarter 4

And, bringing the final count to 14, the last books of 2018.

The Persauder by Lee Child

     "'No,' I said. "Not really. I don't really care about the little guy. I just hate the big guy. I hate big smug people who think they can get away with things.'
     'You produce the right results for the wrong reasons, then.'
     I nodded. 'But I try to do the right thing. I think the reasons don't really matter. Whatever, I like to see the right thing done.'"

"Theoretically he should have been unconscious. Or in a coma. It was probably thirty years since I ever had to hit a guy more than four times. But he showed no pain. No concern. He wasn't unconscious. He wasn't in a coma. He was dancing around and smiling again. He was relaxed. Moving easy. Huge. Impregnable. There was no way to hurt him."

Jack Reacher goes undercover to finish a job he thought laid to rest years ago. Wandering around the city streets one night, Reacher spots a dead man walking in the crowd. Using his old military connections, Reacher attempts to investigate further on his own. Instead, he gets drawn into an off-the-books DEA undercover operation. Now, with time running out, Reacher will need to out maneuver a New England mansion filled with enemies, find a missing DEA agent, covertly collect evidence of the illegal operation, and put a dead man back into the ground.

I mean, I've read a bunch of these books already, so I'm not going to do a lot of work explaining it to you. If you like mystery and action, or those Tom Cruise movies, or dislike all the fantasy books I've recommended, then this is something for you. I think the biggest change in this particular book is watching Reacher outwit opponents. Reacher tends to be a character that lives in the moment and solves his problems there and then. As Reacher embeds himself with the criminals from the first chapter and will need to stay undercover through the story until his mission is complete, he'll need to think on his feet to outwit his opponents and convince them he is an asset while still gathering the information he needs.

I know that I've been reading a lot of these Jack Reacher books lately and, if you're dedicated to using these reviews to find new books (you shouldn't), you're probably getting sick of hearing about them. I honestly did have another two or three books that I was going to read first, but then I was going on this trip and I wanted a book I could travel with: something small enough to put into my bag and I could easily pick up and put down, just to read whenever I've got some free time sitting on the plane or at the airport or just waiting around in general. The other ones were taller or thicker or might be something I didn't want to put down, not really something I would feel comfortable carrying around. So I went out of my way to buy the next Jack Reacher book about a week prior to my trip knowing that Child's stories tend to fit this criteria perfectly.

No Middle Name by Lee Child

"He had been in the military all his life, first an officer's kid, then an officer himself, raised on bases all over the world, and then he had fallen out into civilian life and couldn't really settle down to the kind of existence normal people seemed to have. So he wandered the land, seeing the things he had never had time to see before, going here, going there, staying a night or two, and then moving on. No bags, no schedule, no plan. Travel light, travel far."

"But Reacher wasn't about to wait for it. He had learned to fight a long time ago, in hot dusty outposts in the Pacific, and cold, damp alleys in Europe, and hardscrabble towns in the South, against resentful local youth and tribal military kids, and then his techniques had been broken down and built back up by the army, and he had learned the golden rule: Get your retaliation in first."

"Smart as a whip, probably, but any human given instructions is at a disadvantage. Your target is a big guy, very tall, gray suit. And however smart you are, however quick, that lethal one, two, three question-and-answer drumbeat occupies precious mental milliseconds, at least big guy check, very tall check, gray suit check, like that, and the problem comes when the big guy in the gray suit occupies those same previous milliseconds by walking straight toward you and breaking your skull with his elbow."

If you get a big enough following, it seems, you'll eventually be asked to contribute a story to a collection someone somewhere is putting together (Jim Butcher, Neil Gaiman, etc). Which is where I assume this collection of Jack Reacher short stories came from, 11 previously published short stories put together into one book, as well as one brand new novella. Like with most collections of short stories, there are going to be good ones, sometimes a bad one, and most of the time a lot of "meh" ones. Most of the stories in this collection were just "meh" but there were three that I really liked: "Too Much Time" finds Reacher arrested for a crime he didn't commit and he must use his own detective skills to find the real criminal and outwit the local agents; In "Second Son," a 13 year-old Jack Reacher recently moves to Okinawa with his family when his dad is restationed, getting into trouble with the military boys already living there, and, of course, working his way out of said trouble; and "Small Wars" is a short story from Reacher's time in the Military Police, investigating the murder of an up-and-coming lieutenant colonel.

The best part of this collection, assuming it's all canon, is seeing Reacher in different phases of his life. In the books I've read so far, the stories all feature Jack Reacher, the drifter. In this collection, we're introduced to a teenage Reacher, a couple stories featuring Reacher as a military police officer, and, of course, Reacher the drifter. We also get to see Reacher interact with non-bad-guy types: just going around and doing the right thing amongst ordinary civilians, standing-up to the military he was once a part of, and talking it out with the defeated and downtrodden.

While on vacation, I realized I was reading The Persauder too quickly and might need to invest in another book soon (I didn't realize how much time I would spend waiting around in places; and, because I'd been traveling alone for a week, just needing something to do while eating alone ... I should've spent more time on my phone). Anyway, so one day I did a search for English bookstores and found one in Itaewon that I could even search their website to find what they had in stock. They didn't have the next book in the series, but they did have this collection of Jack Reacher short stories that I didn't know existed. Also, if you're not reading these books, that's typically how Reacher introduces himself, or is introduced: "First name, Jack. Last name, Reacher. No middle name."

Tarnished City by Vic James

"The truth was, everyone in Britain wore a collar they couldn't see. Millions of people, unquestioningly obeying the Equals. Slaving for ten years in appalling conditions. Subject to rulers they couldn't choose or criticize. Confined to a country they couldn't leave until their days were done. And accepting it all as normal."

Set in an alternate England where those with magic, known as "The Skill", rose up and took over the country back in the Victorian era, the story follows the present day lives of the unSkilled Hadley family as they attempted to peacefully serve their 10 years of slavedays, and the Skilled Jardine family, once more at the head of the Equal regime. The second book of James' Dark Gifts trilogy, it's going to be hard to talk about the book without giving away spoilers so here's a warning: SPOILERS





[Hopefully that was enough blank space] After the depressing, hope-crushing conclusion of the first book, "Gilded Cage", the Hadley family is split apart once more, while the Jardine family appears unknowingly divided amongst themselves. As in the first book, James uses multiple points of view to tell the story, the chapters representing a switch in the character telling the story. Maybe I've just gotten really bad at it, but I can't think of a major, overarching plot other than the characters striving to create a better country. For the most part the story is about several characters and how their lives and goals intersect. Luke Hadley, the Hadley's middle child, is sentenced to Condemnation for assassinating the Equal Chancellor. He'll need to find a way out of a prison surrounded by criminals before he can get back to helping better the lives of those like him caught up in serving their slavedays. Abigail Hadley, the Hadley's oldest child, is on the run and looking for allies to help her free her brother, eventually getting caught up in the revolution to overthrow the Equals. Gavar, the Jardine's oldest son, finds himself with more political power than he ever wanted while his main focus is on providing a better life for his illegitimate, and unSkilled, daughter. Bouda Matravers-Jardine, Gaver's newly arranged wife, likewise is given a high-ranking role in the political world as she seeks an even higher role of Chancellor but begins to see the ugliness behind their world and how it could be better for everyone. Silyeon, the Jardine's youngest son, further manipulates behind the scenes, seeking out knowledge of the Skill and what it might truly be capable of.


As in the first book, James splices in a greater political worldview after the rise of the Skill. Gilded Cage gave background on the past and how the introduction of the Skill led to the overthrow of monarchies, revolutions by the unSkilled, and even the schism of the United States of America. Tarnished City gives more information on how the Skill shapes present day politics and governments. Three world powers are ruled by the unSkilled with their technological and military might. Three other major world powers are ruled by the Skilled in almost the same way as in England where the Skilled put on displays of their power to keep the population in control.

One thing I forgot to do before reading this book was re-read the previous book. As I complain practically everytime, I'm really bad at remembering names and now, with several months between reading the first book and then this one, I managed to forget a lot of the important side characters who now play a larger role in the story. I do like though, that James doesn't ease the reader back into the story with a recap of the characters. "Oh, do you remember this person? S/he is blah, blah, blah who did blah blah blah," some writers might say, but not James. The story just carries on as you should already know who everyone is. Eventually, I managed to put all the pieces back together and figure out who everyone was again ... after several chapters.

And finally, with something I've never done here, speculation for the final book. So, Bright Ruin, the third and final book is already out, but I don't want to buy it in hardcover. And with the way this story is going, I'm really not sure how it will all end. Most stories, no matter how helpless things look, there's always this little bit that reminds you that the heroes will prevail. The heroes always have at least one more trick up their sleeve, or a forgotten hero returns to the battle, or an enemy begins to show a weakness. But with the Equal government in control of society and their already physical superiority to the unSkilled, this might be one of those stories that ends with the revolution failing and society remaining unchanged. After all, do the protagonists always have to win?

Grand Adventure

I still suck at planning, which is weird and a little sad to say since at one point in my life I had imagined making a living from plotting.

In just about a week, I'll embark on what I referred to in my head as The Grand Adventure. When I first thought of this crazy scheme, I planned an entire tour across Asia: Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, etc. Unfortunately, I can't swing that much money or vacation time, or I could but it would really cut down on the time and money spent in each country, or just splurge it all and extend it way past the amount of vacation time available. Plus, I'm not sure how my brain and body will react to not working for that many days in a row as I've basically hit a rhythm of working everyday. So, what The Grand Adventure transformed into is a week in Japan and one week one and a half weeks in South Korea, which seems like enough time to explore both places, if I knew what I was doing.

First off, the number one reason for this trip is for a reunion weekend with some of my dormmates from Plume IS from back when I studied abroad at Keio University

I really feel like I should have a better picture with everyone, but I can't find it

I've seen just about a dozen of them over the past 10 years (either here or abroad) but it's going to be really cool for a lot of us to be in the same place at the same time. I'm assuming from the silent Facebook stalking I've been doing over the years, everyone has something interesting going on with their lives and it'll be fun catching up and hearing all about it. Plus, you know, NOMIHOUDAI! (that is sadly the extent of my Japanese, besides "Toire wa doko desu ka?" and "Tabako wo sutte moo ii desu ka?") Luckily, for the most part, I'll be surrounded by friends whose Japanese is much, much better than mine, and who are also much, much better at planning than I am. I'm sure they've planned enough to the point that all I need to do is show-up and mooch off of their hard work. Thanks again. I guess in the one or two days after everyone leaves and I'm still in Tokyo I'll wander around ... I don't know, I haven't thought up that part yet ... I'll probably just catch pokemon I guess.

And then it's off to Korea ... where I'll ... umm ... I'll be in Korea. Really, the only thing I originally planned on doing in Korea was visiting my cousin who teaches English over there. And then, after setting up the trip, I remembered to ask her if it was okay that I didn't know any Korean. None at all. I managed to get by in Japan with very, very limited skills and some really good friends. Only after I got excited by this idea and booked my flight did I tell myself, "Hey moron, what the hell are you thinking?! You don't know any words, or even letters, and no one is going to be there to hold your hand through this. Are you insane?" Well, she reassured me that I should be okay without knowing anything, though I'm still not sure if it's because most people might speak English, or if she thinks that I survived Japan on some top-notch charade skills. She also dumped on me a load of places to check out in Seoul that I really should get around to looking over just so I can create some semblance of an itinerary, or at least look up activities to do.

If you've been following my newest obsession/addiction, then you may have guessed that I did look if any of my favorite Kpop groups were going to have a concert while I was there. I also checked if Scandal would have anything, but I'm pretty sure all the concerts were after I left Japan. Anyways, at first there weren't any so my cousin set me up with a tour website that'll let you into one of those live music programs on Korean TV that fill up my Youtube feed where you can watch the groups perform their songs. My biggest hope is that Dreamcatcher is still performing their latest song, though I doubt it since they released it about a month ago already. My silver medal hope is that Twice actually does release their new song while I'm there since it might mean that they'll perform that night as well. After getting my tickets to that, my cousin let me know that if I could extend my trip a bit, we could go to the Blackpink concert. I had to turn it down at first: I was already taking the longest vacation I've ever been on; I would need to reschedule 2 different flights and re-book my hostel stay; I would need to clear the extension with work where we are already short-staffed, etc. Then, when the second set of tickets went on sale and after a long, long mental debate, a couple nights of "gentle" encouragement from my friends ("Alan, what are you doing, just go to the concert!", "Quit your job and go to the concert", etc), and suppressing my travel anxiety long enough to make a rational decision it finally clicked, "Alan, this is Blackpink and it's probably going to be your only chance to go!" So, I re-booked everything I dreaded doing, informed work that I was going to be gone another couple days, and asked my cousin to make sure I don't charge the stage. "Alan, you can't reach the stage from our section on the 2nd floor." "I'll find a way." And so, thanks to the generosity of others, I now have one concert ticket, one music show pass, and a folded-up piece of paper with a bunch of words that I assume are places written haphazardly. It's looking like the start of a great trip.

I know I say this every trip, but this time was definitely worse. I really do suck at planning. Procrastination hit hard this trip as I left basically everything to the last minute. As I write this I've still yet to start packing, I still need to look up things to do in both Japan and Korea, and there are probably a bunch of things I'm going to discover I still need to buy. Also, my plane takes off ... tomorrow ... or right now depending whenever I finish writing this. I feel like the biggest reason is that things just tend to work out for me, that even with my poor planning skills (and even worse grasp on reality) nothing truly terrible has yet to befall me. I know that's a horrible way to think about it, but it's kinda true. I managed to survive hiking Mt. Fuji with just a hoodie and 2 t-shirts when I should've packed warmer. When our Spring Break Seattle to San Francisco trip was cut short, we were first in line and managed to get 2 rooms in a hotel and our flights rebooked to come back home. When I lost my passport within an hour of landing in Australia, someone turned it over to the ticket counter and I got it back as quickly as I lost it. When I got lost wandering around New York and Seattle, I randomly stumbled across the right train station, or got on the right bus, to get me where I needed to go. It's almost as if I'm waiting on something really, really bad to happen to me before I change my ways. [*last minute note: apparently the music program tv show audience I was supposed to go to got cancelled earlier this week, so I guess it was lucky I gave in to peer pressure and agreed to go to the Blackpink concert. So like I said, things tend to work out, so far.]

And finally, (you can skip this part if you want, there's nothing about my trip after this) the worst part of this whole thing has been that my anxiety coping mechanism - writing - seems to have been severed from me as I've forgotten how to write. For example, this entire post took me about two weeks to write. Yeah, TWO WEEKS to write about something I've been excited about for a couple months now. That should not happen. Typically, the words should just flow out and I would finish this in a day or two, and just taken extra time to find pictures and videos to link. I discovered this new disability earlier this month and still can't quite get over it. With all the time I've spent on this, I haven't given writing stories a try again, but the last time I did I was trashing everything after a couple sentences, if I could even get it started. It's frustrating and annoying and then I realize I'm wasting time writing anyways since there's other, more important, things to do right now, and then I get annoyed and frustrated all over again.

Books of 2018: Quarter 3

King's Justice by Stephen R. Donaldson

I just happened to come across this book while walking the shelves at Barnes and Nobles one day and just figured I'd pick it up since I haven't read Stephen R. Donaldson since high school. I enjoyed the first 6 of the Thomas Covenant series, never got around to the last 4 books. Anyways, this caught my eye since I assumed he stopped writing a while ago. This turned out to be 2 novellas and though it only totaled about 300 pages, it still felt long. It's 300 pages, I'm sure I should've been able to fly through that, which I might've, but it felt like it took a lot longer to read. I'm not sure if that was the style of the Thomas Covenant series, or if it's just because the pacing didn't move as fast as the other books I was reading at the time. A lot of time is spent in the characters' heads compared to other books I've been reading recently which were more action/movement oriented.
King's Justice: Black is the stranger riding into town to investigate a murder in a normally peaceful town, and to deliver the King's Justice. There he finds the murder is not as it seems, but luckily Black is no ordinary investigator. With him comes the King's Justice, something for which no one can prepare. A bit more philosophical but definitely in line with what I remember from the Thomas Covenant series, the climax of the story focuses on the balance of competing forces: Light vs Dark, Good vs Evil, and even the forces of nature themselves.
The Auger's Gambit: Mayhew Gordian, the Queen's Hieronomer, discovers doom comes for their island nation in the readings of sacrificial blood and entrails. Every reading he makes shows the same outcome no matter the choices he or his queen make. Knowing that enslavement or civil war await, he must learn all the secrets that make his people special to save everyone. The thing that I liked the most about this story is that the main character was a Hiernomer, a character typically depicted as a bad guy in stories due to the bloody work they do. It was a interesting change, as Mayhew's work is bloody and is given some imagery in the story.


An Unkindness of Magicians by Kat Howard

"Ian bent his hands at such severe angles, it looked like they would snap. He spoke a phrase that scorched the back of his throat, that spattered blood across his lips and sent a dragon of flame rising into the air."

"'Magic, at its heart, starts with sacrifice. You have to give up something to get something, and because magic is big, with all that it allows you access to, what you give up has to be big. It has to be meaningful.'"

In New York City, the heads of the magical Houses are notified that The Turning has begun. The tournament to decide a new head of the magical community usually occurs just once a generation, however this one has begun earlier than expected, and in less than half the time. Some magical houses recruit contenders to fight on their behalf, others nominate one of their own, all of them looking to show their magical skill. What no one prepares for is newcomer Sydney, an unknown to their society but someone who is determined to change magic forever. 

I'm not sure where the influence came from, but the story definitely has a post-Harry Potter feel to it. Prior to the Harry Potter series, magic in other stories was easy: wave a wand and say some funny words and magic would solve your problems. In this story, magic is done with hand motions, no wands. The words are not just random nonsense phrases or butchered Latin. Instead when the characters speak, Howard never gives the said word (which can sometimes derail the flow of the reading) but describes the sound of the word typically in terms of what the spell is capable of doing. As I said, this helps to keep the flow of the reading because if you're like me, you could spend several minutes trying to figure out what you think is the correct pronunciation of the word, and if you're like 12 year old me, you'll waste more time trying to cast them hoping that it actually works. And, unlike Harry Potter magic that just always seems readily available to cast, magic in this book has a price to pay: pain.

Though I usually have some issues with it, remembering all of the characters wasn't as big an issue as it was with other books. I think what really helped was that the main cast was introduced in separate sections in the first chapter, establishing who each character was and their importance to the story.


Calypso by David Sedaris

Regarding his sister's suicide by asphyxiation : "I've always like to think that before killing myself I'd take the time to really mess with people... When you're in the state that my sister was in, and that most people are in when they take their own lives, you're not thinking of anything beyond your own pain. Thus the plastic bag - the maximizer, as it were - the thing a person reaches for after their first attempt at an overdose fails and they wake up sick a day later thinking, I can't even kill myself right."

Regarding doing good deeds: "You're not supposed to talk about your good deeds, I know. It effectively negates them and in the process makes people hate you. If there's a disaster, for instance, and someone tells me he donated five thousand dollars to the relief effort - this while I gave a lesser amount, or nothing at all - I don't think, Goodness, how bighearted you are, but, rather, Fuck you for making me look selfish."

I bought this book without any foreknowledge besides reading good reviews and that Sedaris has a dark sense of humor. Also, at the time, I was writing that 3-part (which turned into 4 unfinished parts) Eulogy series and I was having some trouble (still having trouble) getting it all down. So I was looking for something that could help me out. Plus, it was on sale (20% off I think).

Like most of his books (I'm assuming as I haven't read any of his other books) Calypso is a seemingly random collection of stories about his life. I honestly don't know if their was a common theme through all of them, maybe because I wasn't really looking that hard. I was just entertained by EVERY SINGLE STORY. Some of the stories are inherently funny, like when he talks about his Fitbit obsession, the entire chapter about his height, or learning about insults used in other cultures; but some of them get deep and dark, such as when he talks about his sister's suicide, his relationship with his father, growing up with an alcoholic mother, coming out to his family and friends. In all of these stories though, he always finds something about the situation to poke fun at or make a joke just as things might start to get really, really serious, providing a balance between the dark and the light. It was amazing to read and I'm definitely going to look for more of his books.

I understand that most people don't like reading, but if you've ever wanted to read something and you've been reading these reviews to look for something, this is the book you should read. I've been loaning movies to a co-worker of mine, and one of the rules she gave me was no Sci-Fi or Fantasy, which knocks out about 3/4 of my movie collection. So, I understand that a lot of the books I read fall into this category too, but ... I forgot the point I was trying to make. Oh, if you've been skimming these posts looking for a book that wasn't another fantasy book, this is the one you should get. I think that's where I was going with this, anyways.

note: it was really hard to find short quotes that I could use as the stories he tells are so connected and well put together that to just isolate a sentence here or there without its proper context would just be baffling and you'd have no idea what I'm talking about.


Red Sister by Mark Lawrence

"It is important, when killing a nun, to ensure that you bring an army of sufficient size. For Sister Thorn of the Sweet Mercy Convent Lano Tacsis brought two hundred men."

"Flicked wrists, arms cracked like whips, and throwing stars take flight, possessed of their own fierce rotation, bound on twisted parabolas. No mother gave her child so much direction, or set them spinning along their course through the world with such care."

Nona Gray is rescued from the hangman's noose to be trained as a sister at the Convent of Sweet Mercy. The church, however doesn't just teach young girls to become nuns faithful to the Ancestor, but trained killers as well. The story follows young Nona as she goes through the first two classes at the convent (Red, during which the girls are trained in combat; and Grey, where they are trained in poisons), as well as discovers secrets about herself and the world. The first book in what I assume will be another trilogy, this book covers the first part of Nona's training, establishes the setting, as well as reveals intriguing aspects of their society that will probably play a bigger role in the later books. (note: Gray Sister is out but I'm waiting for the paperback version).

My favorite part of Lawrence's writing is the way he writes fight scenes, and, like his other books, this one doesn't disappoint. If you don't believe me, try it: watch an action movie then try to describe it in full detail with every single motion, and watch your audience's eyes glaze over. To talk about a fight scene solely on the character's actions is boring. Lawrence though manages it through pacing and word choice, making it feel real and exciting and even intimate as if you were involved in some way. It's something I've yet to learn to replicate in my own writing.

One of the hardest parts of this book was keeping track of the huge cast of characters. As I've said before with other books and, sadly, in real life as well, I'm terrible with names and it gets worse when I'm introduced to a bunch of characters. Though I think I remembered all of the trainees, I know for a fact that even by the end of the book, I couldn't remember who were all the Sisters.

Bank Heist: A Sovereignty Story

At 3:47pm, exactly on time, we began the mission, first shattering the front windows of the bank. Through the door strode a costumed man in a yellow and green suit with green leather-like wings, myself following right behind. "Ladies and Gentlemen, this is a robbery!" Thunder Dragon announced as he let loose a bolt of lightning that tore a hole through the lone bank security guard. "Everyone move over to the other wall and put your foreheads against it. You better be kissing that wall!" Without hesitation, everyone in the bank ran to the other side of the building, leaving just Thunder Dragon and I striding through the bank lobby, as well as the tellers still behind the counter. Two of them, as planned, easy enough to for both of us to watch along with the hostages.

Well, not all of the customers ran. One or two others in the room made a move to stop him, some lowly D-rank Supers who had been standing in line to cash their paycheck or pay off some loan. Luckily, we already predicted there might be a couple of Supers hiding amongst the crowd. The Mystic, our own A-rank psychic supervillain, blending in with the other hostages, covertly slowed their movements. If I needed to guess, some sort of illusion making them think they were moving faster than they actually were. I moved toward them, focusing my copy abilities to mimic Thunder Dragons's powers so that I could send a tazer through them both and knock them unconscious.

Instead, Thunder Dragon stepped between me and the other two men. In the next second, Thunder Dragon electrocuted both of them, killing them before their lifeless bodies could hit the cold linoleum floor. Then he laughed.

I glared as he walked over to the teller stand. "You didn't have to do that," I said. It wasn't that I opposed killing, I was a supervillain after all and it was part of the job we were getting paid to do. I just hated that he took so much pleasure in it. Our bosses at The Sovereignty understood too that supervillains needed to kill, that way we could maintain a sense of fear in the general population. The Sovereignty, a group of powerful corporate leaders just wanted to keep the world the way that it was without the Supers, especially those in The League, trying to go about changing that. Best to keep them fighting other supervillains than toppling dictatorial governments or oppressive regimes or corporations that didn't give full refunds, especially those which hold value to their business interests. After all, who knows what kinds of changes a single man with the power to control the weather, or a woman who could bring down the moon would make to the world.

"Hey," Thunder Dragon said, shoving one of the tellers hard into the wall, "fill up the bag. No funny business." He tossed the duffel bags over the counter.

I jumped over the counter and began filling my own bag. One of the tellers looked to me and I created a cluster of sparks in my hand, lightning forming around my arm. Terrified, he started shoveling money into the bag, hands shaking. Unlike his, I had fast hands, fast enough to finish clearing my register long before him and to move onto the next, unoccupied register. Fast enough to ensure that only two tellers would be the only two working today by slipping a laxative in a coffee cup or puncturing tires on a street-parked car. Fast enough to pocket several stacks of bills into my own pockets.

"We're done," I said, grabbing the full bags and jumping back over the counter. When I'd gotten next to Thunder Dragon I emptied my pockets onto the floor and whispered, "You brought this on yourself." I backed away, lightning formed in one hand. "What the fuck is this! Did you really think you could steal from us!" I paused, turning slightly to make sure some of the braver hostages turned their heads toward us. I could hear some of them whisper as they pointed and got others to turn as well.

"What the hell are you talking about!" Thunder Dragon shouted back at me, empty hands in the air. Then he saw the money on the floor and the lightning in my hand. "Hey, no, wait." Before he finished, I put a bolt through his chest, making sure he couldn't reveal my own deception. The murmuring from the previously silent crowd was practically deafening as they watched one supervillain kill his own teammate for stealing from them. That would definitely keep them afraid of us.

Then came a loud Boom! and plaster rained down upon me. "I guess there's no honor amongst thieves," said Captain Shield, his blue cape fluttering as he hovered down, stopping inches above the floor.

"Oh no, it's Captain Shield," I said, trying to convey as much worry in my voice as possible, but finding that hard to do as well. This was part of the plan too, after all.

In an instant, his superspeed put him right behind me, one of my arms retched behind my back. "Surrender evil-doer, you are under arrest."

"I surrender! Oh God, please don't hurt me!" I said, again loud enough for everyone in the bank to turn and watch the show I was about to put on. With my copying ability, I channeled The Mystic's psychic abilities and reached into Captain Shields mind to find what angered him the most. Then I prepared for the beating.

It came quicker than I expected. Suddenly, everything went white as I felt the weight of a sledgehammer hit me from behind, sending me flying into the far wall of the bank. Then I was flying again, lifted airborne to the roof before crashing into the desks below. I'd managed to tap into some of Captain Shields super-strength as he pummeled me across the bank interior for what felt like an eternity. Though stronger than usual, I could still feel the damage already done, and the blows he continued to rain down, though not lethal, were going to hurt and bruise.

Then came a voice from across the room. "Captain Shield, what are you doing?" she said, bringing the crowds' focus onto the Super thrashing a man who had already surrendered. "What are you doing?" she repeated, her voice on the verge of crying. A psychic wave of sadness and disappointment ebbed through the bank and I felt myself dropped onto the floor. I had to smile, just slightly, as The Mystic worked her powers onto the crowd.

"No, no, I'm not sure what came over me," Captain Shield stuttered. He backed away several paces as the crowd continued to stare. Then he took off through the roof, leaving them silent and agape. I lay still on the floor, bruised, battered, beaten. Inside, I laughed as the mission couldn't have gone any better. A couple nights in jail and then I would be out on bail. A supervillain crime requiring a superhero response would keep the Heroes too busy to change other parts of the world. Thunder Dragon, that psychopath, had been taken care of. I'd maintained that sense of fear of supervillains in the general population. Doubt had been sown within the people for putting too much trust in their own heroes. Mission accomplished.



So, it's been awhile since I've written a story for, well, various reasons. Anyway, the other night I was looking to get back into writing so I started scouring Reddit Writing Prompts just to start diving into something, and what do I find right there on the front page but the prompt: "Superpowers exist, but the world is still controlled by money. Business moguls, oil sheikhs, etc. employ the world's supers." And sure, I found a couple of other interesting prompts to write stories on, but this one immediately stuck out as it reminded me of the superhero story I keep finding myself coming back to, "The Sovereignty." Though I never got too far with that story, there were several stories that I wanted to tell within that universe. This one is close to one of those stories: the main character goes on a heist job with another supervillain, during which they would be confronted by a superhero, and the main character would kill the other villain he is supposed to be working with. Obviously, there are some differences too, such as the main character being so confident in his plan (in the original, he is new to supervillainy) and the hero he would confront would be more of an asshole. Well, either way, here's another story, maybe I'll actually return to The Sovereignty, hopefully it won't be months again until I start writing stories again.