Editorial #10 – Silence Your Meaningless Excuses
Yes, it’s that time again. I subvert the main principles of an editorial and use it purely to explain why I’m such a terrible anime blogger. You’d think after three years of repeating exactly the same process it would alert a man to his ebbs and flows, to the innermost core of his blogging soul. But no, the cycle of neglect and guilt continues and I roll out another editorial to explain away my negligence to the five people that still read.
But, for the most part, I’m using this to describe my plan of action for the coming months. Months notable for their complete lack of university education (and social life) and thus months that will accommodate protracted and consistent anime blogging. I’m not suggesting a particular link between the two, oh no, but seemingly I post more when I’m not distracted by other major life activities. Think of it as a giant metaphor for men being completely useless at multi-tasking and I the most manliest stereotype since Kamina.
Currently, however, I’m caught up in some serious academic intensity. Namely the dreaded Finals. I’ve got a Literary Theory exam on Monday, a Victorian exam on Tuesday, a day off and then a Shakespeare exam on Wednesday. This particular trio of joy have been dubbed The Triple of Doom and Lit Theory in particular is going to completely end me as a human being.
My main point in explaining this is that April is a no-no when it comes to anime blogging. This is a particular pain in the arse because seemingly it sees the start of one of the best anime seasons in recent memory (from my perspective at least). I honestly can’t remember when I had more than five shows to follow from a new season, let alone six of the bastards. Granted, this may rapidly decrease when the shows become their True Forms (around episode three traditionally), with xxxHolic being on probation particularly, but it’s still somewhat unprecedented. Here’s a full list for those who are curious:
Currently, my strategy is to maintain episodic coverage of Ghost Hound adding Kaiba and Soul Eater to the line-up and then perhaps Library Wars if it rocks (which it must). The rest will be subjected to irregular brainfart editorials and spur of the moment thoughts. Hopefully this will co-exist nicely with my recently acquired position as manga reviewer for Anime UK News, as well as a few things I want to write for an upcoming ABC project.
One restriction I really want to impose is a five hundred word limit for every post I make. Not only because it will avoid the tl;dr problem that seemingly blights the internet, but also to help improve conciseness and stop me waffling in unreadable incoherent ways.
But, to avoid the irony of this editorial being longer than five hundred words, I’ll leave it there.
April 18th, 20086:19 pm at
Amazing, you managed to make your “why I’m not blogging about anime post” ultimately relate to anime. ;_;
Also, pssh, 500 words is the beginning. Sooner or later you’ll slip into 600, then 700, then one day you’ll wake up and realise how far you’ve gone when you’re at 2000. It’s a slippery slope.
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April 18th, 20086:34 pm at
@Owen: I’s gots dem skillz, son. Also, I deny your pssh-doubt of my word limit. It’s been in action for a few posts now and has held out thus far. Believe in me, Sat-chan. Some people are able to control their verbosity. <3
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April 18th, 20088:05 pm at
I often oscillate between 500 and 1000 words. A very strict word limit isn’t good; you must allow yourself space. Good luck on your exams; I look forward to your concise yet meaningful posts. I’m looking forward to more editorial posts than summary posts, however. For one thing I don’t watch the same anime that you do. :)
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April 18th, 20088:27 pm at
Hmm, 500 is very ambitious. That is like 5 paragraphs… I consider my posts fairly short (2 paragraphs summary, 2 paragraphs impression) and they are consistently just under 400 words.
Here is a better solution: use really really small font =D.
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April 18th, 20088:42 pm at
[...] Hige: One restriction I really want to impose is a five hundred word limit for every post I make. Not [...]
April 18th, 200811:29 pm at
@Michael: Yeah, editorials have the benefit of being less specific, which I like, but they’re also much harder to write. The sense of achievement when cracking out a good one is definitely satisfying though, so I strive to write more. :3
@Kabitzin: It really depends on the show I’ve found. Writing only 500 words on a Ghost Hound episode will prove pretty freaking difficult, whereas a more action-oriented show like Soul Eater might be the opposite. It’ll be interesting to see how well I abide by it when getting down to business.
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April 19th, 200812:10 am at
I tried to keep my posts as short and succinct as possible (my uni career was science-based, which drummed the ‘keep to the point’ mantra into my head) but inevitably my love of waffling wins over; my posts are now longer than they’ve ever been and there’s nothing I can do anything about it. Maybe my work really is tl;dr but I couldn’t write it any other way if I wanted to!
As for the new season I’m waiting for next week. Hopefully I’ll have time to watch the first two eps of everything by then and write a preview post. In the meantime I want to see the likes of Ghost Hound, Clannad and Kaiji to their conclusions and blog them first. I’m so glad I work office hours…
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April 19th, 20083:16 am at
Martin, the same goes with me. But even my literature teachers drummed into my head to keep things simple: there were deductions with write-ups that exceeded the limit, and the limit was often times 1000 words or three pages double spaced, so I oscillate over that number.
I don’t know, while I appreciate (I love Faulkner) the serpentine style in fiction, I could never really stomach it when it comes to stuff as (supposedly) simple as blog writing. Because when one writes tl;dr posts, they are exhaustive (sense or nonsense). And for the most part, I feel that the writing is a cover-up for the actual ability of the writer itself, because it is much harder to distill ideas than to ramble over them.
While I appreciate your blog, the nature of your posts prevents me from commenting on them. As I’m still in uni I don’t really watch much anime at all, and reading what you’ve written would probably spoil me on series I still haven’t seen – which is the reason why I don’t comment much on your blog.
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April 19th, 20087:02 pm at
@Martin: Good call. I’ve still got buggerloads of series to finish off, too. I wish the allure of newness wasn’t so strong. ):
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April 23rd, 20082:21 am at
I completely understand your sentiments. I’m in quite the opposite situation, spring break is just started for me. All of my exams come after this break, O_o. Anyway, good luck with the Trio of Doom and I’ll be looking forward to 500 word posts. ^^
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April 23rd, 200810:15 am at
@Xerox: Eek, exams after holidays are a bitch. They always undermine the fun you have with ‘revision guilt’. But thanks for the well-wishing – the third of the trio is tomorrow and then I’ve only one left! Then it’s sweet blissful freedom :D
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