*jumpstarts the blog*

Okay, it's been over a month since I updated this.  Where to start...

• Organized some data, including a spreadsheet on when Equestria Daily had hit X million pageview milestones.
• On the time travelling beat, saw the most mind-numbingly awesome fireworks over Labor Day weekend. Swing by St. Maries (Idaho) one of these Labor Day weekends - you'll be glad you did.
• Saw episode 1 of Season 2 via streaming.  My sleep cycle is shot, but the event was worth it.
• Have been getting ready for the new school year, which starts this Wednesday.  Plans include organizing a massive singalong of "Winter Wrap Up" on March 19th, which is the last normal day of classes... and it's the day before the Spring Equinox.
• Went to the TVtropes page for My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic [danger: TVtropes link!] and discovered a pair of links to the spreadsheet I had mentioned earlier.  Day has been made.  ^_^

Current to-do list includes completing assorted projects and remembering to update this blog.  See you later!

Busy August

Huh, almost forgot this.

Time for another round of time travel, so I'll be busy this weekend.

*looks for a pickax to use on this writer's block*

For Norway.

Condolences for Kim Fluttershy Dykas.

Molten brains and shattered steel?

There was something I was going to be doing... now, what was it?

...

Oh yeah - drawing the visualizations for the explanation of 9-space.  Oops.

I could blame it on the heat over here, or the fact that I finally crafted an avatar on my deviantART page...

Or, it could be because I've been introduced to World of Tanks.  You can often find me rattling around in a M3 Stuart or a T18, generally getting my can handed to me.

Anyway - time to get blown up again.  Chaaaaarge!!!

Creativity has leveled up?

Something happened to me this week.

I seriously started work on a MLP:FiM fanfic, and I got the idea to actually draw ponies.

Up until this point, the closest I had come to either were daydreams and thoughts of concept art.

Now, though?

Now, I'm writing a straight-faced, tongue-in-cheek Rockydash fic, and I have a plan on what my default ponysona is going to look like.  I have several more stories that I might actually write up (even if I don't submit them to Equestria Daily), and a cluster of pic ideas to inflict upon others draw for the hay of it.

I think part of it was me finally going "y'know what?  Screw my low opinion of my skills; I'm going to do this because the ideas are just too entertaining to put down."  Another part was probably someone mentioning in jest that they hadn't seen a shipfic between Rainbow Dash and Rocky from the "Party of One" episode, and me realizing that I could create a story based on that.

Either way, this post on Equestria Daily made me realize: I am not alone.  There is a mountain of creativity in the brony fandom, a never-ending fountain of people creating fanworks and encouraging others to do the same.

Now, back to writing that shipfic...

Weird... dream?

Ugh.  Had one of the least relaxing nights of sleep I've had in a long time.

Early in the morning, I was in the middle of one of those dreams that makes sense at the time.  I think I was facing some foes and was combating them with four futon cushions, which changed into three colors, and launching them in a certain order resulted in a cannon-like effect.

During the middle of this, the dream went wonky.  The view simultaneously shattered like crystal and burned like film, and a voice inside my head like stereo on headphones said "Huh.  Don't think that was the right button."

That startled me awake.  Nobody else was in my room, and anyways that voice was inside my head, not outside of it.  Sleep was a long time in returning, and I wound up sleeping in until later than I was planning.

Still - what the heck was that?

Crafting visualizations...

Well, I was going to explain one of my mental exercises today, but I realized that explaining theoretical concepts works better when there's visuals... especially when the concepts are somewhat esoteric.  After all, we're used to three dimensions and linear time; anything beyond that requires a certain amount of lateral thinking.

*goes off to work on the visuals*

Night air, night sounds

Nighttime - the perfect chance to cool off during the summer.

The sky is peaceful, the low light not a problem as I pace around the back porch, letting my thoughts stretch their legs.  Under the cover of darkness I can enjoy the fresh air with a modicum of privacy, simply listening to the sounds of the night: the hum-buzz of the garage light, the wind rustling through the leaves, the quiet noise of a car driving by, the faint whine-static coming from overhead in the clear sky...

...wait, what?

Back to the present

Just a short note that I'm back in modern day at functional levels.  Still need to finish pulling stuff out of transport, but for the most part I'm here.

The event was good - decent weather, no serious problems in either direction, and no major foul-ups over the weekend.  There were some interesting happenings, but they only make sense if you know all of the details, and I doubt that I could get across enough of them for it to be coherent.

One thing did stick in my mind, though...

At night, after most people had gone to bed and I was left awake to watch the fire burn down to coals, embers, and finally ash, my thoughts turned to idle pondering.  Gazing at the clear night sky full of stars and across the tranquil bay, I found that I could only think of one thing: are there realms beyond our own?  What are they like?  Would I fit in better there?  And perhaps... maybe I could make some friends...?

Late night before a long weekend

It's dark here, and I'm going to be calling it a night soon.  Usually I stay up later than this, but tomorrow's going to be busy, and the rest of the weekend will be even busier.

There's a Civil War event in Port Gamble this weekend, so I'll be time travelling about 150 years into the past on Friday and won't return to the present day until very late Sunday... or more likely, Monday.

Before I go to bed, however, I'm going to enjoy the night air.  It's peaceful, cool, and one of the best times for me to ponder things.  To be honest, I tend to be a nocturnal person by nature - given my druthers, I'd go to bed around dawn, wake up in the afternoon, and be awake for the night... but since I have to interact with a mostly diurnal city, my options are limited.

On the plus side, it makes me a natural for fire watch at Civil War events - I'll stay up as long as it takes for the campfire to burn completely down to ash.

Ah well - might as well enjoy the nights as they come... starting with this one!  Good night!

Initializing...

So.  A blog.

I figure this is the best forum for my idle thoughts, away from the wreckage of my other bloglikes.

So, who am I?  A college student majoring in what had seemed interesting at the time.  Problem is, the more I learn, the less certain I am that I want to continue towards that major!  And to complicate things, I'm not entirely sure what I want to do with my life, or what my best skills are.

At this point, there's just a few things keeping me moving forward: my stubbornness, D&D sessions with family, anime at school, Civil War re-enacting during the summer, and something I found out about in May...

Ponies.

Yes, I discovered My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic [danger: TVtropes link!] near the end of the first season.  I had known that it existed for a while before that, from YouTube channel subscriptions that I barely paid attention to and the signatures/avatars in a close-knit forum I visit.  One day, my curiosity overtook me, so I watched the first episode...



...and then the second, and third, and...

I was hooked.  The show is honestly good - the primary audience might be little girls, yet it's still quality entertainment for the entire family.  Go watch it; you'll be glad you did.

Anyway, tying the threads together.  One of the background aspects of the show is that each pony, as they grow up, discover the talent that they both like and are good at.  At that point, they gain a cutie mark, an emblem on their haunch that reflects that talent.  Until that point, their flank is blank.  Thus, someone who hasn't discovered their talent is a blank-flank.  And since the nickname for an older fan of the MLP:FiM series is brony...

Hence, my moniker of BlankFlankBrony.

Glad to meet you.  And welcome to my life.