Zonorhc

Looks like my theory was more or less correct. Bump anyway. Thanks to eckered and Nadril for their comments. I'd still like some more in-depth criticism or suggestions on improving my style, though.

So now that he's edited the OP, it seems this girl isn't even single. Use my tank suggestion. Or, you know, forget about it because you'll never get the girl. Even if you do, you'd be breaking up what could be a happy relationship because of it.

It's certainly what I expected to see, but that doesn't make it any less frightening. To a citizen of a first-world free market economy, the sight of streets without any visible active commerce is shocking. When I visited India, there was accessible capitalism all over the place, even in the villages. All in all, it smacks of a place that the administration tries very hard to use to appease foreigners' perceptions of their backwards country, but it's quite obvious that a lot of things are set up so that nobody can see the squalor in anything. That said, it's alarming and disgusting in that regard. Everything seems dead and purely utilitarian. I've seen the slums of Mumbai, held to possess the absolute worst living conditions in the world - and I would pick those over Pyongyang, if only because there you can actually see life, and the people are free enough to set up private businesses and see what the rest of the world is up to, even if very few have the means. North Koreans really are only happy with what they have purely because they don't know what they're missing out on. The difference would certainly have been shocking for all those North Koreans who escaped and defected to the South.

Congratulations. You're a loser.

You're only 14? Crap, stop worrying, go outside and do stuff. It's too early to be thinking about what you want to be. Hell, when I was 14, I thought it'd be a sweet deal to be famous and all sorts of random crap like that. Three years later and I've reconsidered that position by a lot. Forget about it. You've got a while yet to mature and figure out what you really like to do.

I intend to go to uni and become a history teacher. Then I'll find somewhere comfortable to live with my girlfriend, and we'll raise some cats or something because neither of us can stand kids. I might write a novel on the side.

Okay, here's what you do: Hop into a tank, and run her over with it. If it doesn't get her attention, she probably isn't the sort you'd want to go out with. If she doesn't survive, she isn't worth your genes. Whenever planning for a long-term relationship, always ensure that your significant other can survive being rammed by a tank.

Good lord! Have you ever tried standing with your feet like that?! Ouch...

It would look better if you put Samus on the left, because then all that empty space wouldn't seem so lacking of purpose. Still, looks nice... I'd say add a border and get rid of one of the curves at the bottom, though.

Very nice photos! I especially like the ones with water as the dominant feature. Kinda makes me wish I had an SLR rather than an automatic. I could use a tripod as well... Hell, at least give me some decent scenery to take photos of here...

The composition is very bland. I see that you're trying to give it a sinister feel, what with the token glowing red eyes, hooded face, and obligatory Wilderness background, but it just doesn't have the right feel to it. Right after fixing the shape of the head and good, give it a tattered appearance, rather than perfect, undamaged material. The hand really takes away from the piece, because not only does it look unnatural just sticking out of the bottom of the frame, it also has that too-healthy complexion that suggests someone who just really isn't evil enough. You can't see enough of the person, but you do see too much of what you can. My advice is to not go for such a close-up shot if you intend on showing very little of the character, but put a lot in the background. Also, placing important features of the piece smack bang in the middle is Not Good At All. At least offset it to the side a little, and give a sense of perspective, rather than just a front view. Those are very boring. Darken the sky. It shouldn't be that bright a shade of blue. You're also more likely to see stars further away from the moon and other light sources.

deviantART linky Same deal. I'm not really expecting too many views or comments anymore, since it's pretty evident that things don't stick around on page 1 unless they're sigs or pixel art... Still, comments are good. Constructive criticism is better.

Next Friday, my HSC examinations begin. Ironically, in the context of your reply, my first paper is English (Advanced).

Feh. To be honest, I'm more concerned about Friday the 20th.

I thought it was fairly obvious... there's a link to the original, which was a pencil drawing. This is just a new version that I touched up in Photoshop.

Nobody said anything about loyalty. They're simply looking out for their own interests. Right now, America is a huge market for cheap Chinese consumer goods, and that's too important a business venture to risk on some pathetic country that has nothing to offer to anyone. Also on the list of countries China doesn't want to alienate is Australia, because we're practically fuelling their growing industry with mineral exports, as well as buying up their consumer goods. It isn't loyalty - it's economics. Which sometimes equates to the same thing.

deviantART link Yeah, basically, I decided that my gallery needs more colour. There I go. Comments go here, comments go there, comments go everywhere... Assuming this isn't drowned out almost instantly by pixel sigs and fakes.

Really? I've never had that problem with any food. I want to put on weight, but can't. Anyway, the monopoly thing is real enough. Goodness knows they've done it so many times here it's not even funny.

ummm China? *cough* Korean war *cough* Hello, I'm your guide to the 21st century. Just to bring you up to speed, the Korean War finished half a century ago. China wants to industrialise rapidly and now relies on trade with regional and international partners, and doesn't give a rat's backside about North Korea because it's more of a liability than a help in anything. Just like america got nothing from going into vietnam. They were fighting there enemies, the communists. If north korea gets invaded (a fellow communist country) you think China are going to just stand by and watch it happen? Of course not. They'll tell the US they disapprove, but they're not going to do their human wave thing like they did back in the '50s. China is communist in name only - they have open markets and a growing merchant class, for crap's sake. That's the antithesis of a communist state, even an industrialising socialist nation, like Soviet Russia between 1922-28. They will fix something up with the US so that they leave a buffer zone and not feel too threatened by an invasion, but in the end, Korea will probably be united under the South's administration. Of course, by then NK will probably be a smoking crater with nothing worth taking out of it, but what's new?

ummm China? *cough* Korean war *cough* Hello, I'm your guide to the 21st century. Just to bring you up to speed, the Korean War finished half a century ago. China wants to industrialise rapidly and now relies on trade with regional and international partners, and doesn't give a rat's backside about North Korea because it's more of a liability than a help in anything.

YAWN. You know, sometimes I feel as though I need to make a list of done-to-death threads that people should stop posting about unless they have something to suggest that's actually original. This is one of the worst offenders. It seems that everytime someone suggests an Oriental-themed area, most of the "idea" is "PMG SAMURAI SORD LOL LOL HAX ROFL HAT!!!1 NINJAS!!11!! ZOMG JAPAN IS TEH ONLY CANTRY IN ASIA LOL NARUTO!!!1 LOL PAWN NOOBZ WIT UBAR WAEPON!!"

Think of it as natural selection.

However, it seems that he's performing his services for a group who are apparently not all of the same faith as he is, and who are otherwise there only because they are compelled to, from what I can see. The problem isn't that he's preaching for his faith, but that he's verbally abusing other people for theirs. Fundies like that are what cause wars to start.

Now, don't get me wrong - I think the Bible has some decent moral ideas within it. It's just that I can't take an overly self-righteous religion like Catholicism (which I assume you're having problems with, what with the baptisms and other miscellaneous rituals) when the book it places the core of its beliefs in advocates incest, genocide, violence against women, women as sex slaves, infidelity, abuse of alcohol and intolerance towards homosexuals all in the one chapter.

This was a piece I wrote for the creative writing section of my Trial HSC paper for English (Area of Study). The overarching theme of the course was the physical journey and how it influences people, and the question asked us to write a short piece relating to the physical journey with special attention paid to the idea that 'what we carry with us describes who we are.' It's probably a little short, but it's optimised to be handwritten in 40-45 minutes. * Sunlight, sickly and pale in the fog, clung to the Sachsenwald in the chill silence of the morning as it lumbered eastward through the waves. Astern were five wretched figures, huddled in blankets and nursing mugs of hot chocolate in trembling hands. Words had been unable to escape from blue lips for an eternity, but behind eyes half-closed from cold and fatigue was the collective mantra of minds: 'All we brought were our hopes, dreams and trust, and where are they now? It could not, it should not, and it did not happen!' The waters trailed behind, the sea's countenance steely-grey. 'You came, you saw, but I conquered,' it seemed to mock them. What ill fortune could befall twenty-one hundred souls who plied the waves! They had come as nobody, bringing nothing but the hope that they would return as heroes. They were alone save for a time when a bearded Aryan face came to say, 'Here - more drink against your suffering.' 'How blind we were,' whispered one, his voice a spectre of defeat. 'Would that we had chosen a different path,' lamented another, who had lost his eyes. 'It was not our decisions which damned us,' said a man whose eyes burned with fervour yet, though his body curled under the blanket like a newborn. 'It is ill fortune which carries the burden of blame for our blindness, nothing more.' Yes, they all saw it: that shell from the Norfolk which destroyed the forward radar. 'Was it an act of justice that ill fortune should have visited us?' wondered the blind man. 'For what crime?' demanded the fiery one. 'We shot no albatrosses nor wore any about our necks. Justice is a watchman standing by the gates in our path; it is ill fortune which is a highwayman, striking as it pleases.' 'Can ill fortune not also be a vigilante?' Perhaps, and they all saw it: the Hood erupting in flames and splitting asunder, damning fifteen hundred souls to the deep. 'No,' came the rebuke, 'for what was our guilt? One might as well incriminate birds for taking wing. We brought no guilt with us aboard, only oaths to serve the glory of the Fatherland.' 'Supposing we had taken a different course -' 'What is the sense in looking back? The past cannot be changed by sulking in regret. It is not man's burden to change or challenge decisions already made. It is forward that we must look, for it is ahead that we always go.' 'It was only ahead that we went given that our choices had been removed from us.' 'No. It is always forward that we go. Turn the tiller to port, and still we move forward. Come about, and the helmsman still faces the bow.' 'How do we know that it was the right direction?' 'Where Lindemann said to go - that is the right course to take.' At this, they all felt a pang of grief, for they all saw it: the salvo from the Norfolk, that devil which had blinded them before, annihilate the forward command post. 'Lindemann could have elected not to take the path we were forced upon. He would still be with us if, after the rudder was destroyed -' They all heard it: the tortured scream of metal and the mocking noise of the torpedo plane's engines as it flew away with all they possessed: hope. '- he surrendered.' 'And what?' the fiery one rounded on his blind compatriot. 'Damn us all to be the crew of van der Decken, unable to return home for shame? No, Lindemann captained the Bismarck, not the Dutchman.' 'Aye,' agreed another sailor, whose teeth chattered incessantly. 'He even delayed our progress to allow the Prinz Eugen to escape.' 'Always forward,' repeated the fiery sailor. 'Did you never look back?' came the challenge from the blind man. They all had, and saw it: the might of Britain's navy, hunting them like so many hounds chase an unfortunate fox. 'No,' the fiery one denied. 'I kept my trust in Lindemann.' 'Must one's choices in life be governed by the decisions of others?' the blind man asked him. 'Would you have all hands be the helmsman, for a ship or a country?' came the rebuttal. 'Yet we scuttled her! We killed her!' They all saw it: the sleek, beautiful body slipping beneath the waves. 'Scuttling the Bismarck was the hardest decision for us all. It was the only way forward, and we took it - and here we still live.' Ahead of the Sachsenwald, the sun pierced the fog like a blade, flaring golden against the prow. Behind, beneath the broken sailors whose only possessions - pride, hope and courage - had been stolen from them, the Atlantic stretched away in shadow, its waves flecked with white, and the immutable steel-grey of the past.