VACATION VACATION VACATION

[cerusee]

Every time I say to myself, "I need a vacation," I hear that Tool song in my head. You know, the one that goes

I sure could use a vacation from this
bullshit three ring circus sideshow of
freaks here in this hopeless fucking hole we call L.A.

Which makes it all the more fitting that L.A. is where I'm going on vacation on Thursday. OH GOD VACATION VACATION VACATION. Ignoring that fact that my flight back is on Tuesday, arriving at 11:37pm, and I'll be opening at work at 8:30am the next day, it's gonna be a blast. I'mma see my Mikke, go hiking, maybe go to a party, and generally bask in the sense of being a few thousand miles away from work.

Ah, work.

The good news is, I haven't screwed up badly in my first few days. The bad news, I haven't slept more than a couple of hours a night for at least a week--I've simply been too stressed from the anticipation of moving into what is, in practical terms, almost an entirely new job with a large element of public performance in it. I have been running not on caffeine, and not on enthusiasm, but on the manic energy of sheer, unadulterated terror. And today, the energy ran out. I'm so tired that eating dinner made me nauseous and exhaustion has eroded all my humor and patience. I am the walking dead. I am, as I accused Geoff of being a few nights ago, dead inside. I am trained in the use of white-out. VACATION VACATION VACATION.


Apropos of nothing, m00nface--hi m00nface! how the hell are ya!--I finally bought and read the first volume of Please Save My Earth. And promptly went and ordered the next four. It reminds me a bit of Fantastic Children, in a somewhat different style.

It starts with a beautiful emotional hook ("I want to go home. I want to go home. I want to go home"), proceeds with an appealing weirdness concerning the extinction of the dinosaurs, and then an equally appealing bizarre little boy, and finishes up the first chapter with a hilarious, and yet sympathetic portrait of the protagonist as she drifts off to sleep, crying about her troubles--petty, profound, and thoroughly heartfelt. Next chapter, cue the knowing commentary on shounen ai in shoujo comics, made interesting with an unexpected twist. Proceed from hilarity to sentimentality to tragedy, and wrap it all up with a sharp--though not unsigned--turn into fantasy.

It's special, and different, and creative, and most of all, sincere. I get the feeling that the author is something special; I'll have to give Tower of the Future (another Hiwatari title currently being published by CMX) another shot--I wasn't planning to pursue it because I couldn't stomach the selfishness and cruelty of the protagonist, but I recognize the same deft hand with human emotion in that as in Please Save My Earth, and I might grow to like it.

Comments

[m00nface.livejournal.com]

I have to tell you, there are things at the start of PSME that don't grab me, like, oh, Rin. Ribbon twirling. I'm sorry, what? But, as with so many mangaka, as soon as she settles in and gets the pesky introduction stuff out of the way, she shows the heart of her characters, and there's far more emotion under that scrappy drawing than most of the prettiest shoujo hair-flicks around. There's so much substance to it that it actually won't let me go, long after I finished reading it.

GEE I WONDER WHY I MIGHT HAVE BEEN TELLING YOU ALL THIS TIME TO GIVE IT A SHOT. (Or maybe it wasn't you. Maybe it was me telling people who liked PSME to try out Fantastic Children. I know I've done that a lot. But if I didn't say it outright, then I was definitely thinking it. IN CAPITAL LETTERS.)

[cerusee.livejournal.com]

You only mentioned it to me once, actually. (Many, many months past--or whenever you last surfaced on LJ, anyway.) I would have bought it awhile ago if the store had had the first volume, but I'm a little lazy when it comes to ordering books--I didn't actually pick it up until I happened across it in another store.

[m00nface.livejournal.com]

I have to admit, this time around I was shocked to discover you hadn't already read PSME, so I think after that one time I must have just forgotten and assumed you'd read it, because it's definitely a story you'll appreciate, particularly with your Fantastic Children experience. (I'm so glad for the capital letters in that name.)

You know what? That's what I'm going to do tonight. Watch some of the PSME anime. It's been forever since I've had time like I've set aside tonight, and I want to join you in fangirling. (Although summer's coming up, meaning rewatching and overanalysis for everything I love, which just so happens to be everything you love too. What an odd coincidence.)

[cerusee.livejournal.com]

Peculiar, isn't it?