I Believe in Aardvarks, Spartans and Vampires

I know I haven't been around much lately and you all have my deepest apologies on this. Life has suddenly become insane - more so than I would have thought possible. To address Joely's comment from a week or so back, I want to participate more in the 1,000 Words a Day Club, because I absolutely love the community and I have material I am working through everyday.

I'm starting to look into publication for the Post-Apocalyptic Story and I've revising a short story for a submission to a science fiction mag in two weeks. I still have my work from classes piling up in drifts...and these are the things that are killing my time:

Speaking in the Third Person: Cerebus the Aardvark

A friend loaned me Cerebus, a comic written and drawn entirely by a man named Dave Sim. The story follows a barbarian aardvark named Cerebus on his adventures across Estarcion and the city-state of Iest. With a weird mix of philosophy, feminism and a brief but touching romance, it's a graphic novel I count up there with Jeff Smith's Bone.

I Believe in Master Chief

I've also been swallowed up by the release of HALO 3, Bungie and Microsoft's Official-Slayer-of-All-Useful-Brain-Cells-and-Time. So far the graphics, the tricks you can pull as a 7-ft-tall Spartan and the game play are simply and amazingly lovely. Master Chief, John 117, is of course the hero and the range of weaponry, shields, vehicles and environments is enough to rock your socks right off. Chief has always been one of my favorite characters in a game. This is probably for the simple face that I've never seen his face. He's an Everyman. A rather tall and heavy Everyman, but sympathetic and easy to relate to because of his anonymity.

This Doesn't Bite: Twilight

On the recommendation of a close friend's little sister, I took the book she loaned to me and ate it up in almost two nights. I'm still a little ways from the end and can't get enough. The story focuses on human Bella and vampire Edward and the strange relationship they begin in the depressing gray land of the Northwest coast. Give it a read - it's part one of a trilogy - and it is SO worth it.

I have school work and a social life in here somewhere. I'm sure. But between these three (and a number of other cool things I'm not elaborating on here), I'm desperately trying not to lose touch with all of you! But I find that I sort of like wading through all the cool and discovering new ways to waste time.

So say we all.
Bri