Penny Hero (dot) Net

Ok. I confess. I’m a closet online-personality-quiz-taker.

How Compatible are You with me?

See above for the news of the day (when I actually get around to finishing it.) For now… just take this quiz. It’s not one of those stupid “Which Barbie Doll Are You?” quizzes. :)

I had one of those dreams last night where it could be turned into a really elaborate story… or if I was clever, a novel.

It was in this fantasy world, kind of out of an 80s cartoon (think She-ra or maybe even Rainbow-Bright… and combine it with The Death Gate Cycle by W&H). The world depended on these golden spiritual warriors to protect the physical world from these evil forces. The evil usually took the shape of big snakes floating in space, or large vicious creatures of some kind, fighting alone, trying to get to the Earth. Anyway, because of these warriors, none of the monsters had ever reached Earth, but they were coming closer and closer. I was a college student, (myself I think) and I always overheard people complaining that the Galaxy Warriors were not doing their job. I myself was scared that the evil creatures were going to finally reach Earth, and that would be the end of us. I think there was an image of a valiant battle between an angelic roman-looking man and a big octopus…

My point of view shifted… and I became this little boy who was asleep. He was about to die because of some gas leak in his room and his spirit woke up in this cave in a kind of tattered bed with a blue knitted blanket on top. A man was waiting for him. He was a thin man, but tall, strange… like a cross between David Bowie and King Haggard from the Last Unicorn. He wore armour, but really thin armour like tin foil. The King-guy said he was the creator of the Galaxy warriors, and that he (the boy) was about to join them. The boy was suspicious, and looked around. He saw all these really exhausted people, dragging heavy swords around, eating really poor quality food, kind of transluscent. Some of them floated like ghosts. It was a horrible dead image. These people were like slaves after death. The boy understood, and said something like “well, I’m not dead yet, so you can’t take my soul.” and he closed his eyes, and then his body woke up on Earth and he ran out of the room with the gas leak.

Somehow I knew all of this when the point of view shifted back to me in my dorm room. I layed down on my bed while my room mate was complaining about the Galaxy warriors. And I fell asleep. I made myself leave my body (like astral projection) and went to visit this Galaxy Warrior King. I remember seeing children dragging swords and wondering how they looked so valiant and strong when seen from a physical body. It became clear to me why the evil was coming closer and closer.

The King knew I wasn’t dead, and knew that I might go back to earth and tell everyone how ineffective the warriors really were, and then, with that knowledge, he would be powerless to convince any newly dead souls to “join” the Galaxy Warriors. But he was very sad, and very lonely, and he told me everything, I guess hoping honesty would convince me that his plight was worth the souls he stole.

I asked him why he didn’t wait until the people he needed died of old age? Why must he create some problem (like the gas leak) to kill people to bring up there?

He said that the souls remain the age that they died at, and old people could not become warriors. So he had to kill younger people. He kept emphhasising that this was the only way to stop the evil. He was scared shitless, and exhausted. The walls were like stone, the floor was stone gray and it was just a huge room with stone tables and stone bowls. Armour and weapons hung on the walls, and above it was slightly transparent and I could see the stars and feel the evil just on the other side.

I gave him no pity. I started to manipulate him. I took his hand, almost in a sexual gesture, and tried to get him to tell me more. he told me everything, the structure of the spiritual world, the kinds of weapons the warriors used, what they eat etc. he showed me the new “recruits” and I saw them struggling with heavy armour, crying and bleeding. I remember one young boy, lifting a golden shield in front of him, and dragging an ivory chinese broadsword behind him on the ground as he went off to battle.

Outside, in the star filled sky, I saw the evil serpents and creatures coming closer… battle raged, but we always only barely won… and the warrior came back dying.

My mind became obsessed with freeing these souls. So I took the King’s hand, held it tightly as if I were his friend, consoling him. And then I took a sword and cut off his head. The souls sang with joy and I felt genuinely happy that I had “saved” them. I don’t know how, but I had forgotten that without the Galaxy Warriors, the evil serpents would swallow the earth.

My dream ended about there. Me feeling so proud that I had saved all those stolen souls, but had sacrificed the earth in the process. I don’t know what it means. I woke up trying to think of another solution. It seemed my dream was telling me that because of my believed self-rightousness, I would become (or already am) blind to some horrible consequences my actions would have. But the consequences would be obvious to anyone else, even myself. It makes me nervous. Makes me question… things.

It was strange.

I’ve decided one of my projects for the summer will be to write a short martial arts story. A good one. One of those Literary Gems, only with a martial arts theme.

My anal retentive, hyper stressed out fiction writing professor constantly bashes martial arts stories in his lectures. He puts them right up there with “Commercial fiction,” and that in itself was motivation enough to begin thinking of writing a martial arts story.

One of today’s stories was centered around a boy who gets picked on a lot at school and his martial-arts-master uncle. (can we say “Karate Kid”?) But the author disappointingly enough, embarrassed himself with his lack of understanding about martial arts. Seeing this, and being forced to critique it, actually inspired me to sit down and start working on my own piece.

I dunno. This is kind of a random announcement. *snort* what am I doing announcing it anyway? Why don’t I just pull out a notebook and start writing?

*exits*

Frustration No. 001:

I’m chicken. Nothing but a big bloody chicken. I want to ask my Japanese teacher a question… but I have so far come up with about 7 different excuses not to. And the three times I actually have gone to her office with the intention of asking, she hasn’t been there.

It has gotten to the point where this whole question I want to ask is stupid. It is becoming old. And I’ve told so many people about it, I wouldn’t be surprised if she already knows I want to come ask her something. Gawd, I feel like I’m back in Elementary school when I would lay in bed awake at night thinking about what I would say to some boy if I saw him over by the monkey bars the next day. And of course I wouldn’t carry out my plans when I actually did see him.

It has become stupid and old and I am almost embarrassed to go try to talk to her now.

Frustration No. 002:

I have come to realize that not only do I not have all the answers, I really have very few. It was wrong of me to think that I failed to help Tomo due to language. It makes me feel like an ineffective person. And I wish that I could be …wise.

Frustration No. 003:

I am a bit scared about going to Japan. I don’t even know how to effectively order coffee. I don’t know how to count things, I don’t know how often people actually use “hajimemashite” or if those things are just taught in class… the way “Hello. How are you today?” is taught in ESL classes in the United States. I’m frightened of the possibility of crowds. I’m frightened that I’ll get lost in Narita airport. I’m afraid of offending someone by using the wrong style of speech. (especially Tomo’s parents.)

On another note. Alfredo Cassero kicks ass. His voice, and the way he combines so many elements of music makes him sound a little like a Japanese Dave Mathews band. I’d imagine that the lyrics also have similar complexity of content. (I love the Okinawan [guitar type instrument] combined with techno-ish mixing.)