My story “The Blue Stain of Piracy” is live on Garbled Transmissions! Also, “Manual Time Entry” was posted to The Daily WTF a week ago. Go check them out!

“We prefer the ways of the water and the wind.” – Old man, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984)

In this installment, I review the animated adaptation of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, the film that was the genesis of Studio Ghibli.

On October 7th, 2012, roughly six months ago, I arrived in Martha’s Vineyard by ferry (a liminal experience, uncle Jim would later explain). Two young, friendly staff members, Chris and Bart, drove me to the hotel, the Island Inn, checked me in, and led me to the common room where everywhere (minus some latecomers) had gathered.

So began the weeklong workshop/crash course in poker/liminal experience known as Viable Paradise.

“It’s a mistake to believe that war only happens to other countries.” - Asbel, p. 23

In this installment, I’ll talk about volume 2 of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, the one where Nausicaä rescues a baby Ohmu and a Torumekian army from an Ohmu stampede.

“. . . In this harsh world of ours, the sparrow must live like a hawk if he is to fly at all.” - King Jhil, p. 24

In this installment, I’ll be covering volume 1 of the Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind manga. (Nota bene: I’m using VIZ’s Editor’s Choice edition, which is roughly analogous to the Japanese collected volumes.)

Image source: Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hayao_Miyazaki.jpg

Chances are, if you haven’t heard of Hayao Miyazaki, you’ve seen at least one of his films. His film Spirited Away won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature in 2003. That film, along with most of his catalog produced at Studio Ghibli, has been licensed and distributed by Disney in the United States. Animation legend John Lasseter of Pixar cites him as an undeniable influence on the industry.

But if it weren’t for a manga published in Animaze in 1983, he may not have found such success.

Another Daily WTF article up: “SELECTing Valid SQL.” I used up my single Joss Whedon reference  card this time, yet I’m also getting flack for including a Lord of the Rings reference as well. Such is life.

I finished my rewrite of The Red Flood last Saturday. I started in early February; overall, I estimate I took 45 days, working 2 hours each day. Besides a couple of substantial storyline changes, I also cleaned up a lot of the action and did some line editing. It’s turning into a proper novel, and while it’s not the most ambitious at 55,000 words, it’s the tightest story I’ve written so far.

“The prophecy didn’t say anything about this!” “Prophets don’t know everything!” –Jen and Kira, the Dark Crystal

I saw Oz the Great and Powerful this weekend. It was an enjoyable but very problematic movie. While I won’t get into the sexism present throughout the movie, I’d like to talk about one plot device in particular that I just can’t stand anymore: easy prophecy.

Within two minutes of our protagonist landing in a forest in Oz, he is approached by Theodora, Witch of the West. “Are you the wizard the prophecy foretold?” she asks. Oz, played lovingly smarmy by James Franco, smiles. “Yes, I am your wizard.”

“The Right Way to Find a File.” Don’t use toddler logic in your code, people. You can read it here.

I’m halfway through my major revisions on The Red Flood, formerly known as Dahlia, my YA SF novel. I’m doing both story changes and line edits, with a focus on the former, as I can pick up any miscreant adjectives in another polish. I had hoped to finish by the end of this month, but it looks more likely that I’ll be done sometime around mid-March.

I also have a new The Daily WTF article, with a groaner of a pun in the story: “A CSV is as Good as RAM, Right?”