...which was only a few update posts ago. Eff.

Well, the good news is that I do have something new for Underwhelming Birthday Party Number Seven: the webcomic recommendation list I've been meaning to finish up for ages is now live. I definitely left off some that I want to rec but couldn't put into words for some reason; most of them are popular enough that I'm sure you've heard of them, but I'll add them (and any others) as soon as I can. I'm also going to post a ficbit or two shortly, so there's that.

I was hoping to be ready to start an LP soonish, but I want to make sure some other stuff is off my plate before I commit to that. Maybe in time for my birthday in January. Maybe. Erp.

Happy seventh birthday, Altered Origin, minimal though it is, and happy archive-bingeing to anyone who gets hooked on Rice Boy or Drive or whatever after reading the rec list. I'm sorry if you're up until 2 AM, but I should mention that I'm also not sorry at all.

I finally finished the fanfiction rec list I mentioned a few updates ago; I meant to have it ready earlier in the month, but at least I posted it before November really got going. I feel like the two people who commented saying they were interested in rec lists will already have seen most of these, at least within the fandoms they're interested in, but hopefully the rest of you will find something new to read! For future reference, you can find this and any other rec lists on the Misc. Writings page, though I'll probably make a quick note of it in the updates anyway if I add more to it.

(I am a little bummed about not being able to include one of my other favorite Pokémon fics on the list since the author appears to have taken it down from FFN and I haven't attempted to see if it still exists on any forums yet. If you happen to come across Mentor by Dagzar anywhere, though, and don't mind that it apparently won't be finished, give it a look!)

The webcomic rec list honestly should've been done well before that one, especially since I had most of my comments written down and just needed to clean them up, but apparently it's harder to do that than I'd thought it would be. It should hopefully show up soon.

That "soon" should be read as "sometime in early December", by the way, because after taking a break last year I'm going to be participating in NaNoWriMo again. Updates will be scarce to non-existent, yadda yadda yadda that doesn't mean a whole lot seeing as they've been scarce all year. :/ But since I'm writing a fanfic (again sob sob why are my original ideas never ready), it is something that can be posted to AO when it's a bit more polished... and as my primary NaNo plan is to write a bunch of mostly-standalone short stories that still add up to one larger story, I feel as though I'm more likely to have stuff that's ready to post instead of a monolithic thing full of monolithic plot holes that collects dust on my hard drive like At Liberty, Incarnadine Harvest and Oh, How the Mighty Have Fallen. The caveat is that, like the aforementioned Incarnadine Harvest, this year's story is not a Pokémon fic (unless I do in fact change my mind over the next few days, which is ill-advised but not entirely implausible) and so will likely not be of interest to the majority of my usual visitors. Still, I know there are at least some people who might enjoy it if I post it here in addition to the more general fic venues, and dammit I need to be doing something on the actually-write-crap-and-actually-post-it front. (In more Pokémony news, though, I do have other plans for some writing that is a bit more relevant to most of your interests. More on that in another update, though.)

For now, anyway, I am definitely working with this Golden Sun fanfic. I'm already 800+ words in as of 12:30 AM (after which I stopped to finish up the rec list and this update), and will get to the other half of my day's wordcount after some sleep and some work. I just hope that leaves me enough time to either feel more confident about what I want to do with the GS fic or else make just enough headway on one of my other ideas to start that instead and not fall too far behind.

Oh! One other thing before I go: I finally updated My Oshawott Never Smiles and fixed the issues that had been pointed out to me. (Hopefully fixed, anyway.) Negrek I am so sorry and I swear that next time you leave concrit on a fic I will not take almost two years to act on it :(

what

what is this

i don't even–

...oh, wait. I do know what it is. After over a year of promises and difficulties, I have finally finished and posted the EV training guide in the Misc. Writings section! I'm currently having another of my ugly internet droughts (though we should be changing ISPs soon, so hopefully it will never happen again!), but last night I decided that I need to just get my crap together and muscle through the rest of the guide. Please give it a look, give it a try, and hopefully it will prove to you that EV training is not the terrifying ordeal or lesson in rocket science most people seem to think it is–if you can count to 42 then you can EV train a Pokémon, so why not give it a shot? And please, after you finish it, contact me and let me know if you have any comments or questions. It's rare that I actually have such a vested interest in being genuinely helpful to other people, so I want to make sure that I've been as clear as possible! Your input can only help me make it even better.

In particular, let me know if you want to see more quick examples of how to EV train specific Pokémon. I was planning to include some but cut them out in the interest of getting this done, but if, for example, you want me to briefly walk you through one way to train, say, a Gengar or a Bastiodon, then I can throw something together if it will really help.

As an extra bonus for waiting so patiently for the guide, I've also dug out more old lineart and added Floatzel and Rampardos pics to the free renders page. Floatzel looks especially cool, if I do say so myself.

Oh, and I've finally updated the HeartGold blog! Twice in under a week, even! It should move along a lot faster now, so keep checking in. You know, if you don't find it painfully boring.

More new stuff and some improvements to old stuff should be coming in the future, which should be easier now that I'm looking at more reliable internet and a break from school. I'll be spending a bit more time trying to get DexGenesis off the ground, for one thing–it seems to have stagnated a bit and my lack of internet has prevented me from really being able to do anything about it, but it isn't dead! Give it a look-see, fakemon fans!

I need to rush to class now, but the next update and some interesting stuff should hopefully come pretty soon! Hooray, better internet!

Crazy, but true! I actually added a sort of interesting page today! And it doesn't even have anything to do with ASB! Can you believe it?

That page, in the Misc. Writings section, is a fanarticle about some of the more confusing Pokémon designs. It attempts to take a crack at explaining those Pokémon with less obvious or incredibly varied origins. I've started by covering two groups of Pokémon, the heavily-debated legendary beasts and the not-so-heavily-debated-but-I-get-annoyed-when-people-say-they're-just-wolves Poochyena and Mightyena, and I'll add more as they come to me; if any Pokémon has ever really confused you, you can email me and suggest that I look into it. I might also add another section to it about designs that aren't so much confusing as they are interesting, so we'll see.

I've got some ASB and some game-related sections in the works as well, so we'll see if I can't get at least one of those up by the end of the month.

I updated the Platinum failblog a few days ago–the newest post covers my trek through the Torn World, so you might find it interesting. I also added another link to the "these are cool" section of the sidebar. It's a Pokémon text RPG I mod at. I know, I know, you're thinking it's Yet Another Uninspired Pokémon TRPG, but it's got a lot more freedom and wanton destruction at the hands of baby Pokémon. Give it a look, it's really a lot of fun once you get going. :)