Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Dixxy Mouri's LiveJournal:

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Tuesday, September 16th, 2008
12:18 am	Once Upon a Summer's Day Vs. Once Upon a Winter's Night So I finished off Winter and I've moved onto Summer (the next two season books are a ways off and I can't even buy Dreadful Time until next month anyways), so I've decided to start comparing them. So far, although Summer is heading towards a definitive pairing between Alain's elder brother, Borel, and a maiden trapped in a tower named Chelle, it definitely doesn't have as much romance as the earlier one did - at least not at this stage of the game. Although were are some sweet scenes, for the most part it's been the Borel show. Additionally, the sidekicks are different. Camille had Scruff, the flightless sparrow who had the ability to tell when danger was near - he would then hide and start tugging on her hair. Borel actually has two sidekicks - Flic, a sprite, and his companion Buzzer, a bumblebee. You read that right. A BEE. Flic and Buzzer are useful, however, because they're providing a more direct route to the final goal than Camille had, but still slightly obscure. Namely, Borel thinks that he needs to go to the estate of one of his father's friends/allies, but after being sent WAY off course and running into his little buddies, they ask him what kinds of plants grew at this estate, since Buzzer may have collected pollen there before. This, I have to admit, is a kind of clever plot device. Flic largely acts as translator and companion, but he also knows a lot about how to use certain plants and has given Borel lots of DIRECT, USEFUL advice as opposed to some of the vague, riddle-like answers given to Camille throughout most of the last book. Additionally, maybe because Borel is a man, but he's way more willing to let Borel get the stuffing knocked out of him. Camille might have gotten a few scrapes and bruises along the way, but Borel's gotten PUMMELED, and has actually spent part of the book limping around being he got hurt so badly. I think the worst physical thing Camille had to endure was trying to drag a horse out of some mud. Lastly, the time frame is DRASTICALLY different. Camille had "a year, a day, and a whole moon", in this case a "moon" meaning one cycle of the moon (at first I thought it was one night). Borel has about a moon. So he doesn't have that extra year and day to play with. As such, there isn't a whole lot of "he spent three days here" or "it took his forty-something days to reach this place", which happens a lot in the first book. So, what's this one about? Borel's been having some strange dreams as of late about a young maiden in a tower surrounded by lots and lots of flying daggers who's asking for his help (for reasons I haven't learned yet, she appears to be blindfolded by shadow). Borel consults his brother, sisters, and Camille for advice and then against his advice decides to take off on his own to go after. . . someone. Minor spoiler from the first book. Anyways, Borel goes home and we get a small look at life in Winterwood, which seemingly involves Borel's wine guy inadvertently getting his master drunk, Borel takes off and ends up landing in hot water. Long story short he's now prisoner of some trolls who want to eat him, and this is where the prince shows just how different from Camille he is. Camille would almost certainly need to get bailed out in this situation - Borel pretty much takes care of business on his own with some assistance from Flic and Buzzer, although Borel had to rescue them first. So at this point it's basically the tree of them going after Chelle (he figures out her name shortly before he's in the troll dungeon) and talking about love and such. I really enjoy this one a lot, too, and part of the enjoyment is probably because although I know I've looked at stuff towards the end before (I really stink at not looking at the endings of books), I don't actually know how most of it is solved. Somewhere there's a chess maneuver involved, but this is also mentioned in the acknowledgments and upon a flip through there are some charts that have chess stuff on them. Going to read more of that book now. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Tuesday, September 9th, 2008
2:09 pm	Behind on updates a little tiny bit Title: Thick as Thieves Chapters: Prologue + 15 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Many Link: Down the Rabbit Hole Summary: Karsh makes a friend. Title: Thick as Thieves Chapters: Prologue + 16 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Many Link: Girl in Trouble Summary: Dario has a decision to make. I appear to have chased people away with Chapter 16 - except for Triple C. I took things in a direction most Chrono Cross fic writer's would traverse. That, or it's the start of school. Oh well. Makes me wonder if I should pay more attention to that last part of Deadline or go back to Freedom, which, in my mind, is becoming a convoluted mess. I'm seriously considering just saying "fuck it" to Freedom and just picking up after Dark Chocolate, White Diamonds. Or just dropping the entire series. We'll see what happens. School has started up again, and I'm in the last stretch of college. I'm living in an apartment with two of my friends and I've got a mixed class load. I've got two very work intensive and homework intensive classes - can we say 12 novels in one semester?! can we?! - and some very not-so intensive classes. I'm also trying to do more reading - on top of the twelve novels for classes. Right now I'm in the middle of Once Upon a Winter's Night by Dennis L. McKiernan, which I first read in high school and is probably the last book to really capture my attention that wasn't a graphic novel or assigned for school. I'm re-reading it to get to the second book in the series with a fresher memory of the first story, and then I'll go on to three, four, and five (WHICH IS COMING OUT IN PAPERBACK NEXT MONTH!!!). What do I think of this book? It's enjoyable. Do I love it? Not sure. Would I recommend it? For fantasy and romance lovers, yes. It's a love story, but it doesn't have a sex scene every three or four pages. It's mostly a fantasy adventure, most notably a fairy tale retelling. The series this book begins - the Faery series, or the Once Upon series - is a collection of fairy tale retellings. The fairy tale here is "East of the Sun, West of the Moon", which, probably because of Disney, I don't think is as well-known as "Sleeping Beauty" or "Cinderella". I think the second book is supposed to be a variation of "Sleeping Beauty", but I'll figure it out when I read it. Once Upon a Winter's Night focuses primarily on Camille, the youngest daughter of a poor farmer. One night, during a blizzard, a big white bear appears outside their door with a message from Prince Alain of the Summerwood in Faery, asking for Camille's hand in marriage - in exchange, the prince will make them wealthy. Although her mother and sisters are after the life of luxury the money would provide, Camille ultimately accepts this proposal because the money would help her ailing little brother, Giles. Camille leaves with the bear as her steed and guardian towards the Summerwood. Once in Summerwood, however, things are somewhat amiss. She never sees Alain during the day, and when she does see him in the evening he's either wearing a mask or in the dark. Although the idea was for her to come to Summerwood to marry him, no wedding can take place yet. Regardless, Camille falls in love with Alain and becomes very close with the other residents of her prince's manor. Sometime later, Camille visits home, where her family is perplexed by the situation in the Summerwood (and her mother is embarrassed that Camille has been sleeping with Alain before she married him). She suggests that her daughter light a candle in the darkness of Alain's bedroom after he's fallen asleep to see his face, which, shortly after her return to Summerwood, Camille decides to act upon. Naturally, this is a bad idea. Your first clue should be her terrible use of logic. Your second clue should be that this takes place around pages 150 or 160 of the paperback edition when there's still around 250 pages to go. Lastly, I'm pretty sure the blurb on the back cover talks about this at some length. So now Camille's got a quest to go on - she has "a year, a day, and a whole moon beyond" (so a little under 400 days) to find "a place east of the sun and west of the moon". She has with her only a flightless sparrow named Scruff and a magic staff from the Lady of the Mere, who only appears in times of great need. One of the reviews on Amazon openly criticized both Camille and Alain as being "too perfect" - Camille is a beautiful young maiden with a beautiful singing voice who seems to enchant a large number of the male characters in the book. Alain also suffers from a distinct lack of flaws. But it's not a literary piece of fiction, so that isn't the goal here. The goal is to entertain, and the book entertains. I've got less than 100 pages to go in this one, but alas, I have to read other books for two of my professors, so I probably won't finish tonight or tomorrow night. But probably by the weekend. WHOO-HOO! Until I journal again! glimpsed the foreboding end.
Wednesday, August 6th, 2008
3:30 pm	It's a Thick as Thieves update! Title: Thick as Thieves Chapters: Prologue + 14 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Many Link: Midnight Walk Summary: Dario looses something else. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Friday, August 1st, 2008
12:25 am	LOTS O UPDATES! Title: Deadline (Chapter 20) Chapters: Prologue + 20chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Sanji/Nami, possible Franky/Robin later Link: Finally Over Summary: Only not quite there yet. AND Title: Thick as Thieves Chapters: Prologue + 13 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Many Link: A Safe Place? Summary: Norris makes a few hard choices. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Saturday, July 26th, 2008
5:24 pm	Thick as Thieves Updated This is not a fic I update often, but for anyone unfamiliar with it, it's a Chrono Cross alternate universe fic based on a previous story I had written called Memories. Thanks to Triple C this fic might be updated more often. As another warning this is one of the few fandoms I actually include some form of shounen-ai/yaoi, and this chapter does have a focus on one of these pairings. Title: Thick as Thieves Chapters: Prologue + 12 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment MAJORLY Alternate Universe!!!! Link: The Rain Summary: Things begin to better before they get worse. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008
12:38 pm	Fic babbling Herbal supplements are great! The Good: -Steadily loosing weight on Weight Watchers -Have a job -Been buying new clothing -HAVE A NEW LAPTOP!!! --Toshia Satellite --200 GB harddrive --3 GB memory --Intel Duo Processor --Vista is not as terrible as I've been told --It was less than $650 The Bad: -Personal issues - boo -Cleaning - boo Hmm. It's nice to see more good things than bad things. Though "personal issues" could be divided up more. . . it's nice to see good things! Fic wise (which some of you may or may not still care about): Deadline The next chapter is just not where I want it yet. Granted, some things still need to be written, but I can't help but feel that in its current form it is falling on its face. Thick as Thieves Crystal Cat-Chan's favorite subject on Messenger - she's basically my official idea bouncer for that story. And many others. Basically, Thick as Thieves is slowly becoming one of the more complicated fanfics I have ever taken on - possibly including the Ronin Senshi stuff. Why? Because it's something of at LEAST a third alternate world. PLUS at some point there will be a story depicting how the absence of Dario, Karsh, and Glenn in the Dragoons and the closing of the port will affect Serge's adventure (you know, that guy who's the ACTUAL star of Chrono Cross?). Maybe I'll do a short companion story or something. Freedom Necessary changes had to be made to some of the planning stages. Conveniently there is at least (in my opinion) one bad-ass moment for Rowen coming up. A Lunar story!? Yes. I'm starting work on a revision of one of my old Lunar stories (in this case, a reinventing of "Shattered Hearts"). More on this once I get an outline and a prologue done. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Tuesday, June 24th, 2008
2:55 pm	Save One Piece! Whoops - meant to post that in a different journal -.-* While I'm here. . . foot hurts, working on fanfics, summer break. Whoo. 3 Unicorns glimpsed the foreboding end.
Friday, February 15th, 2008
9:13 am	17 credit semesters kick my ass Okay, so sometimes it's my fault I'm playing video games when I'm not doing homework. But I definitely need to develop better study habits this semester. Some of my classes have rather large work loads that I am just bad at keeping up with. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Monday, January 7th, 2008
9:43 pm	Another Deadline Update Title: Deadline (Chapter 17) Chapters: Prologue + 17 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Sanji/Nami, possible Franky/Robin later Link: The Value of Life Summary: Luffy gets angry. VERY angry. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Friday, January 4th, 2008
11:09 pm	Deadline - 16 Title: Deadline (Chapter 16) Chapters: Prologue + 16 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Sanji/Nami, possible Franky/Robin later Link: Racing Against Time Summary: A dream and a race against time. Also: Title: Beneath the Surface (Chapter 4) Chapters: Prologue + 4 chapters, incomplete Rating: T for the moment Pairing: Link/Malon Link: <"http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2004294/5/Beneath_the_Surface">Chapter Four</a> Summary: Malon and Navi find Saria in the Sacred Forest Meadow. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Wednesday, December 19th, 2007
12:53 pm	So close. . . By the end of the day I'll be DONE with finals for the semester, then I got a month off. Which is a good thing. Deadline is within. . . six to seven? . . . chapters of its conclusion and everything else could use some attention (though I did recently update Thick as Thieves as well). Well, Mom'll probably have stuff for me to do around the house over break, but that's okay, I guess. I need to clean out my room at home - it's getting redone at some point. As long as I have a say in the colors, it's cool. Okay, I need to go buy stamps. Later. Current Music: Styx - Blue Collar Man glimpsed the foreboding end.
Thursday, December 13th, 2007
4:26 pm	Back Last post, September 11, 2007. Current post, December 13, 2007. Yeah. . . Classes are going all right. And this is on average. Some classes are going super - others are kicking my ass, like the one I'm currently waiting for help in. Fic stuff? I've updated Deadline a chapter or two, and I updated Freedom with THIS: ( SPOILERS ) My normal computer might need to go into the shop (it's probably needed to for a while) after finals are over, which means some of my fics might go on hiatus until I get the laptop back. Some fics won't be affected if I a) start them or b) have not started the next part, meaning I could write it on another computer. So much updating I want to do. . . and so many collegiate finals that are standing in my way. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Tuesday, September 11th, 2007
5:37 pm	Fic Progress and Other Things Well, Deadline has come to a halt while I wait for some beta reading to get back (though I understand my beta reader has just started college), but the next chapter of Freedom might get out soon. And I think some of my longtime RW readers are going to jump for freakin' joy. That, and I also went back and edited a detail in CoC in order to make something work a little bit better. Having some roommate issues. She's a freshman, I'm a junior, but she's actually a lot more acquainted with campus than most freshman because she has a junior boyfriend. When she's in the room it's kinda annoying, because she's not in the room enough for me to really feel comfortable around her AND her boyfriend (especially when they start kissing and stuff - that probably needs to stop if she wants the BF in the room PERIOD). Good news is she might move out at the end of the semester. YAY! Also, mildly addicted to Gaia Online. 2 Unicorns glimpsed the foreboding end.
Saturday, August 25th, 2007
1:02 am	30 Kisses So I'm part of 30 kisses, and I'm kinda considering doing a set. Any suggestions? These are some of the fandoms I'm familiar with and would be willing to do a set for: -Ronin Warriors -One Piece -Chrono Cross -Chrono Trigger -Lunar: Silver Star Story COMPLETE -Lunar 2: Eternal Blue COMPLETE -Magic Knight Rayearth -Slayers -Legend of Zelfa: Ocarina of Time Any thoughts? glimpsed the foreboding end.
Tuesday, August 21st, 2007
3:43 pm	The Big CC Collaboration Chris-kun, Triple C (who was just invited in) have recently gotten a lot of work done on the big CC collaboration. Like, we actually have more solid bad guys who have MOTIVE and stuff. Yay! Currently re-playing Chrono Cross, though I briefly touched an old CT file and before that started TP again because I still can't figure out where that damn poe is. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Sunday, August 12th, 2007
5:39 pm	Meme from Chris-kun's LJ 1. Post a list of up to 20 books/movies/anime/TV shows/video games/etc. that you've had an obsessive fannish love of at some time in your life 2. Have your friends list guess your favorite character from each item. 3. Post in your own journal. I'll note how many I'm looking for for each series .Ronin Warriors (5) .Chrono Cross (8) .Lunar: Silver Star Story COMPLETE (4) .The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (2) .One Piece (uh. . . 8) .Slayers (1) .Rainbow Brite (2) (hey, you said SOMETIME in my life) I might add more later. 15 Unicorns glimpsed the foreboding end.
Thursday, July 19th, 2007
3:26 pm	LJ is fun I'm having a little bit of fun with the LJ communities thus far, and I've gone ahead and joined a few more. Updated Beneath the Surface - for the first time in nearly two years. 6 Unicorns glimpsed the foreboding end.
Tuesday, July 17th, 2007
5:14 pm	Yeah, I've still been quiet. Probably because I'm so used to my personal LJ and not my online life LJ. But I may have a use for it! LJ COMMUNITIES. According to Ms. Lena Ban Obsidian (or Lydia or whatever it is she's going by these days) a lot of people are bailing on Fanfiction.Net in favor of LJ. So I think I'm going to try my hand at some LJ communities and posting fics and what-not there to at least have a use for this journal. In other news, updates since my last post: -Started work on Freedom, the new sequel to Consequences of Capture -More on Deadline -I posted an End of Innocence v2.0 chapter recently (five words: Point Blank Super Wave Smasher) Okay, going to experiment with the Sanji x Nami LJ community to try and get some feedback. glimpsed the foreboding end.
Monday, March 26th, 2007
2:34 pm	ANIMATED GIFS! One of my professors informed me that I have the capabilities to make animated gifs. This makes me pretty happy because now I can make my own animated avatars! WOO-HOO! glimpsed the foreboding end.
Friday, March 9th, 2007
10:47 am	Update I should probably try and post here more often. Since my last LJ post I've posted two more Deadline chapters, the last of which I've gotten mixed reviews on (though one of them might be a general review of the whole story). It was short and a bit explanation heavy, but also a critical turning point in the story. One of the OCs now has a name and a purpose. And there are more revelations for the other OCs. Freedom has an outline is coming along. I kind of want to have the basic outline done before I think about publishing the prologue, but I have a general idea for what I'm doing with the plot. Go me! Have a good day! Current Mood: tired glimpsed the foreboding end.