...Aaaaand I'm Back!

Did you miss me? Felicity really wanted to take a break from filling in for me this week, so I agreed to step back in and take over again for a while. Don't worry, it's cool, I'm still hard at work on the Book Two revisions, and in fact, I'm happy to say that I'm a little ahead of schedule so far. So, I figured I'd give you all an update on what's been going on besides that.

Second Player Score played a couple of great shows this month. On Saturday the 9th, we did Anarchy Radio's 3rd Birthday Party at the Oak Grove Bar and Grill along with our good friends Stab In The Dark and Laurelhurst. Tons of fun, great crowd, and cake! Mmm, cake.

We also played a couple of new songs live for the first time: "Demon's Kiss" and "Origin Story." Both of them will be on our upcoming second album that is due out next year. More on that below!

Then, on Saturday the 16th, we rocked out over at the Adams St. Bar in beautiful downtown Camas. We were joined by our usual showmates Stab In The Dark, along with Kings and Vagabonds and a great band that had just come out of semi-retirement, The Secludes. I'm glad they're playing again, 'cause those guys kick some serious butt.

As for our second album, Boot Camp continued in earnest once those shows were done. What is Boot Camp, you say? Go back and refresh your memory by reading this post from a couple of months ago! We have studio time booked for July, and we're planning on recording two songs: "Deep" and "Comets." So, we set up the good ol' 8-track and made a demo of "Deep" this past Saturday.

Intense guitar face

Then on June 13th, we'll be back at Shanahan's in Vancouver along with Stab In The Dark and another great band, Medium Size Kids, who you should really check out. Seriously, do it now. In fact, here's a link to one of their cool videos. Once you hear them, you're really not gonna want to miss this show. I know I'm looking forward to it.

Video game update: there is none! I stopped playing Fire Emblem after I got to the final-final boss because I had basically screwed up along the way and didn't add the right characters or whatever to be able to beat it, so I gave up. After that, I gave Pier Solar and the Great Architects a try, but it hasn't really caught on for me just yet. I might give it another shot, but in the meantime, I'm really just waiting and waiting for an announcement about the new Xenoblade's release date. C'mon, Nintendo, you're killing us here...

Guest Post #3: Felicity Talks Avatar: The Last Airbender

Yo, Felicity again. I really didn't feel like doing fill-in blog-duty this week, but that dude kept whining and begging and stuff (ed: no I didn't) so finally I felt sorry for him and said fine, whatever. Seriously, I don't know what the heck he's spending so much time working on. It's like he's trying to write a novel, or something.

Anyhoo, I'm just gonna ramble aimlessly until I fill enough space to call it a day. So, last week I was talking to Joel about his favorite female sci-fi/fantasy characters - again, not my idea - and when he mentioned Katara from Avatar: The Last Airbender, it brought back some memories about that show, which I actually kinda liked when it was on.

For those of you who aren't familiar with it, it was a TV show that was on Nickelodeon from 2005 to 2008, and it was about a kid named Aang who could manipulate - or "bend," as they called it - all four elements (air, water, earth, fire) while other folks could only do one, if that. It was set in kind of an alternate world that was like Earth, but not really, because, you know, of all the bending and stuff, and it had this totally Asian anime-type flavor to it.

There were three seasons, so it was like a trilogy, and the storyline was sort of your basic reluctant-chosen-one-saves-the-world-from-the-evil-warlord kind of deal. But the writing was really good, and there was a nice balance of action and humor and all that stuff that makes things fun to watch. Since I have a black belt in karate, I also appreciated all of the realistic martial arts moves, which I've heard they put a lot of effort into to make them look authentic and stuff.

I also liked how the girls in the show were portrayed. Like Joel said last week, Aang's co-star Katara was a strong character who wasn't just tagging along and healing Aang whenever he got hurt. Well, I mean, she did that too, but she really kicked some serious butt with her own waterbending skills and saved the day on her own more than once (in fact, at times I felt like Aang was a little too dependent on her). And other female characters like Toph (I looove Toph), Suki, and even crazy Azula were independent, powerful ladies who could more than hold their own against anyone.

So, yeah, in case you haven't guessed by now, I would say that if you haven't watched this show yet, you should totally check it out. But don't watch the movie adaptation of it - seriously, just don't. It's bad. Not like the so-bad-it's-good kind of thing - it's just bad.

Well, I think that's enough for this week. Maybe next time I'll do one of those liveblog dealies where I'll watch an episode of this show and talk about it while it goes on. Or maybe not. Laters

Guest Post #2: Joel's Favorite Female Sci-Fi/Fantasy Characters

Okay, Felicity Smith here, back for another week of boring busy work filling in for what's-his-name while he's off working on some kind of manuscript or something. I actually think that he's taking a vacation, but whatever.

So, last time we left off with me interviewing Joel about his favorite female sci-fi/fantasy characters (not my idea). We decided that we were just gonna do his top five because there's no way I'm gonna sit through one of his entire lists, which can easily get into the hundreds. I'm not kidding. All right, here we go.

Me: Yo
Joel: Um, hey.
Me: So, top five female sci-fi/fantasy characters. Go.
Joel: Wait, what?
Me: Don't you remember? We talked about this last week.
Joel: Uh, well...
Me: Don't think about it too much.
Joel: Okay. Well, number five would be a tie.
Me, sighing: Of course it is.

#5 (tie): Katara (from Avatar: The Last Airbender) and Korra (from The Legend of Korra)

Joel: So, yeah, it's these two.
Me: Okay, tell me why.
Joel: Why what?
Me: Why do you like them.
Joel: Oh, uh, well...I dunno, they're just really strong characters who can fight and do awesome stuff.
Me: ...and?
Joel: And, uh, you know, Katara really helped Aang with his journey, like teaching him waterbending and stuff, and she was supportive of him, but independent too. Like, you know, she wasn't just a sidekick or something like that. She played a big part in the whole story. And Korra, I mean, well, she's the Avatar. You can't get much more awesome than that.

Me: Those are actually pretty good reasons.
Joel: Did you know they're both from the Southern Water Tribe? I thought that was kind of cool, because -
Me: Yes, I've seen the shows. Let's go to the next one, shall we? Who's number four. And please don't tell me it's a tie.
Joel: It's not.

#4: Princess Leia Organa (from Star Wars)

Me: That's a pretty obvious choice.
Joel: Yeah.
Me: So, reasons?
Joel: Well, kind of similar to Katara and Korra...she's strong and does her own thing. She's in charge of the Rebel forces, she can use a blaster, and she's even Force-sensitive, although she doesn't really know it.
Me: Dude, I am so glad you didn't mention the metal bikini.
Joel: I, uh, well, I, um...
Me: Moving on.

#3: Katniss Everdeen (from The Hunger Games)

Me: Hold on, I need to grab a soda.
Joel: Okay.
Me:
Joel:
Me: All right, I'm back. So - Katniss Everdeen, eh?
Joel: Um, yeah.
Me: Why.
Joel: To be honest, I actually didn't like her too much at first, because she seemed to be kind of mean and grouchy. But then the more I read, the more I started to like her. She really cared for her sister, and she made friends with Rue instead of killing her, and all that stuff. Plus, she was really good with the bow and arrow, which was cool.
Me: And who can forget "Thank you for your consideration."
Joel, laughing: Yeah, that was sweet.
Me: Sure. Okay, who's number two.

#2: Hermione Granger (from Harry Potter)

Me: You realize that these are all, like, really well-known characters. Don't you have some obscure favorites?
Joel: Well, yeah, I mean, I didn't have much time to think about this, so I just kinda went with the ones off the top of my head. I can list a whole bunch more if you like, just give me a few minutes to -
Me: Forget it. Hermione Granger, yay. Tell me about her.
Joel: You don't know who Hermione Granger is?
Me, sighing: Of course I do. What I meant was, tell me about why you like her.
Joel: Um, she's smart, good at spells, strong, independent...
Me: I'm starting to sense a recurring theme here.
Joel: Huh?
Me: Never mind, continue.
Joel: Well, uh...that's it, really.
Me: Okay, great. number one, here we go.
Joel: Should I do a drum roll?
Me: No.

#1: Princess Zelda (from The Legend of Zelda)

Me: I should have guessed.
Joel: I like her 'cause she's -
Me: Yeah, yeah, I know, she can fight, she can use light arrows, and even though Link has to rescue her a lot, she does seem to be able to hold her own, especially in the later games. She's even a pirate in Wind Waker, and her Sheik alter ego kicks some serious butt.
Joel: Wow, you seem to know a lot about her. I though you didn't play video games?
Me: I don't. I just read all this stuff somewhere.
Joel: Um, okay. So why did you ask me for this list, anyway?
Me: I dunno, it was that other dude's idea - you know, the guy who runs this blog.
Joel: Oh, right.
Me: But yeah, that's a good question - why would he want me to talk to you about your favorite female fictional characters?
Joel: Yeah, I mean, it's not like you're a fictional character or anything.
Me: Wait, what did you just say?
Joel: Um, nothing.
Me: Hmm. Well, anyway, I think that's good enough for this week. Even though I don't really want to, I'm pretty sure I'll be back next time to talk about something else. Hopefully something that I choose. So, until then, later.
Joel: Bye.

Guest Post #1: Felicity Interviews Joel

Hey, what's up, I'm Felicity Smith. The dude that normally writes this blog said that he's busy revising "Book Two," whatever the heck that is, so he asked me to fill in for him this week. Now normally, I would have told him no way, but I guess I owe him for all the diet sodas I've been drinking out of his fridge, so here goes. Keep in mind that I'm not a writer (I hated English class, even though I always got As, thank you very much), so I know that this post won't be as good as - oh, who I am kidding, I've read some of this guy's posts and they're actually pretty terrible, so I'm sure that whatever I throw together will be better than anything he's done so far.

Anyway, when I asked him what I should write about, the first thing he said was "anything you want," but then when I said "okay" he said "on second thought, why don't you interview Joel about his favorite female sci-fi/fantasy characters." I was all like "that's a strange subject to be talking about" but then he was like "oh please please just do it I'll buy you more soda or anything you want" [ed: I didn't say it like that] so I was like "fine, whatever." So I grabbed Joel and sat him down for this interview.

Me: Sup Joel.
Joel: Hey, uh...
Me: Felicity. C'mon, you know who I am.
Joel: I know, I just...what are we doing here?
Me: That weird old guy who writes this blog wanted me to babysit his deal while he's working on some crazy project. I dunno, just go with it.
Joel: Um, okay.
Me: All right, so the subject he wanted me to talk to you about is "favorite female sci-fi/fantasy characters."
Joel: Whose favorite?
Me: Yours, I guess.
Joel: Mine?
Me, sighing: Yes.
Joel: Uh, well...
Me: I know, that's kind of a strange topic, right?
Joel:
Me: Kinda borderline creepy, if you ask me.
Joel: Sure.
Me: Why don't we do your top five. I know you're all into top-whatever lists, so this should be pretty easy.
Joel: Oh, okay, yeah. So are we going to start from number five, and then count backwards to number one?
Me: Sure, yeah, whatever.
Joel: Okay, well, number five is -
Me: I'm gonna stop you there, 'cause I'm supposed to be doing this for a while and I think we've taken up enough space for now - I mean, since I know how to stretch things out pace things properly, we'll save that for next time.
Joel: Uh, all right.
Me: Cool. Smith out.