Okay, so it's been over 2 months since I even visited DA, let alone checked anything, and I'M SO SORRY! I had a slight case of A LOT OF BROKEN BONES from a motorcycle accident, including several in my right arm and hand, and I wasn't really able to type all that well...And now I've started classes again, and then there's always work, so I've been busy. Not to mention my PC breaking. I'm pissed about that, REALLY fucking pissed. I spent a ton of cash on my HP Blackbird 2, not only to have a kickass gaming rig, but because I wanted a PC that I could use for several years to come without having to worry overly much about being too far behind in upgrades, and that was sturdy enough to weather all of the abuse from my hands. I should have known within the first month that I had the PC that it was going to be all trouble since that was roughly when I first catastrophic problem with it, but I remained optimistic. Unfortunately, during it's short life, I was always having to fix shit, and twice I sent it back to the manufacturer. So yeah. All together, I spent somewhere around $9k on the damn thing, including the original cost. Kris thinks my motherboard was corrupt from the beginning, which would explain the inordinately short life of my RAM, power supply, and videocard. Oh well. What's done is done, and now I have a brand new PC, custom built from IBuyPower.com!!!! And oh joy of joys, is this thing NICE!!!!!!!!!! Sure, I hate Windows Vista, but Windows 7 will be released in a few more weeks, and I paid the extra $30 or so dollars for the certificate to get the upgrade to Windows 7 for no additional cost when it comes out.

For less than $2K I built a high-performance Gaming PC that could run circles around the HP Blackbird 2, and I have a kick-ass warranty that guarantees full-scale coverage for several years to come in case if something goes wrong. And my god, games that I thought looked pretty damn good on my old rig are just FUCKING AMAZING NOW!!! Crysis, Far Cry 2, Call Of Duty 4&5...I was practically drooling on myself the first time I loaded Crysis on my new PC. I'm running it at 1680x1050 res, with all of the graphics settings turned up to maximum, and 16x anti-aliasing, something I never even ATTEMPTED on my old PC (it lagged horribly on an ultra-low res, low settings, and no anti-aliasing, practically unplayable -though I stuck it out because that game is hella fun), and it runs smoothly, with no crashing, zero hiccups. I also played through Call of Duty 4 and 5 again, as well as Assassin's Creed, Wolfenstein, and Left 4 Dead just because they're all so PRETTY now! I can't wait for Assassin's Creed 2, Left 4 Dead 2, and Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (CoD:6) to come out now that I don't need to worry about my videocard and processor being able to handle them. It's such a relief.

Anyway, I've done some new artwork, not a whole lot, but some. I'd *like* to get all of the art from like the last 5 or 6 months scanned and uploaded, especially since some of it is requests and trades, not to mention some fan art, and of course, the usual Eclipse/Awakening series character profiles, scenes, and technical drawings that have just been sitting in sketchbooks getting old. I've pretty much completed The Eclipse series (I've written all of the books, and only have minor editing left to do), and have began to seriously work on it's sequal, The Awakening series. I'm actually surprised at how much fun I'm having with writing, especially since I haven't enjoyed writing like this since back in the early years of The Eclipse series (about 7 years ago ). Sure, it took me a little while to figure out how to make the transition to the vastly different Faerun of the Awakening Series from the Faerun depicted at the end of the Eclipse series, but after several weeks of brainstorming my persistance paid off. I discovered the perfect string of events to anchor the ending of ES to the beginning of AS, as well as smoothly and efficiently introduce the world as it has become in the 19 year gap between ES and AS, without revealing surprise details crucial to any of the plots in AS.

It gives the reader exactly the right blend of History (events ranging from the start of ES to the beginning of AS that are intrinsic to the story.), pervasive suspense and a tease of macabre action (all the while introducing the clever allusions to and predictions of the forthcoming events as interpreted by the protagonists) with a myriad of intriguing plot twists, and horrifying conjectures as divined and dictated by various leading characters in relation to their struggles with the irrevocable shackles of blood, magic and love that bind them to each other and to the destruction of their world. For the opening of the Awakening series, I combined the aforementioned topics into one large, cohesive chapter that acts as the Prologue for the entire series, laying the groundwork and setting the stage for the numerous dark themes employeed throughout, and introducing the perverse, and brutal web of Fate that envelops every character in a precarious, intricate weave that guides each person down the path to their preordained, inevitable Destiny.

Book 1 of AS used to be Prodigy, and was meant to be told by Valentyne Asclades, Vigil and Maeve's youngest daughter-a Psychokinetic spy employed by the Guild. However, due to the timeline, I've had to push Val's book to the no. 4 spot, because if she took the first spot, she would only be 14 years old, and that's just no good for what I have in store for her. Instead, Evelandriel (Eve) Asclades- Vigil and Maeve's oldest daughter- will be the narrarator of Book 1, Eye Of The Beholder. While exploring the Kaersiliya Drakonik ruins beneath the vast Druirfae mountain range in search of Necromantic artifacts, Eve accidentally releases an obscure and inconceivable power from dormant imprisonment from within the oldest, darkest vestiges of the crypts. With Rei Vexander's help, Eve tracks the foreign entity back to the Guild stronghold, only for the people she knows and loves to begin to lose their minds, and behave strangely, violently. It turns out that the entity has begun disrupting and tainting the influence of Fate within the members of the Guild, infecting the organization with corruption, madness, greed and bloodlust in a silent epidemic that shakes the Guild to it's core and slowly destroys it from the inside-out . An unprovoked feud among the ranks begins, severing the fabric of the most pure, and sacred of interpersonal relationships, turning lovers and life-long friends against one another with all the devastating intensity of mortal enemies. The infighting escalates into a full-scale Civil War, though the lines between the opposing sides are not clearly drawn and alliegances are torn down as quickly as they are built, and Eve struggles against the part of her that wants so badly to watch the Guild crumble to ashes.

This series is a continuation of the brief storyline about "Cheating Fate" that started with Maeve and Vigil and Rellik in Book II of ES, and touched on a few other characters during the Eclipse series before inadvertantly contributing to the series finale. Maeve was the first character introduced to intentionally defy Fate, and she also was the one who, incidentally, started the frenzy within the Guild over the evolved and supernatural nature of her DNA, and it's endless similarities to the DNA of the lost Atlantean civilization. The Awakening series is named for the discovery of others who have unlocked abilities thought to be lost since the dissapearance of the Atlantean people, and who, like Maeve, are highly evolved (Maeve was the first character to "awaken" technically. ^^ )

The Awakening series chronicles the lives of several individuals who have, for one reason or another, either intentionally or inadvertantly, defied the very Core Principals of Existance and broke the Laws of Reality as ordained by the highest order of the Divine Races. One can escape destiny simply by forcibly disconnecting the threads between their soul and body from the Divine web of all fortunes. Exceptional Arcane power and mastery of the oldest, most difficult, and "forbidden" spells can be used efficiently to safely sever the Divine influence in one's life, though these spells don't actually destroy the link, but rather misdirect, confuse, or "hide" from Fate. Magic can also be used to pierce the Shadow Plane where all souls reside, and sever the ties of Destiny physically, but the sheer magnitude of the Mana and Ether needed to accomplish such a task is extremely dangerous, and the spellcaster could, if used or bound improperly, cause the magical equivelent of a Nuclear exlopsion. The surest way to defeat the opressing hold of Fate, is to have "awakened" and possess the incredible Psionic abilities, and power of the mind to influence reality. Powerful Psions could, theoretically, will into being *anything* that they can think of. Psions use their mind, rather than magic, to travel to the Shadow Plane, though unlike spellcasters, Psions have no need to physically travel to the Shadow Plane, and instead can use their abilities to rescue their soul from Fate all from a nice, safe distance.

Of course, most people who have cheated Fate are quite unaware of their feat, and ignorant of the repercussions set into motion from the aftershocks of the cosmic anomaly. A few intentionally cheat fate, using extreme and most times lethal methods to scry into their predestined future, and then do everything possible to prevent the events from unfolding in Fate's pattern, going so far as to execute individuals who were destined to influence them towards the Divine . They were all forced into a desperate struggle for the right to forge their own future with complete free will and personal choice, going to the ends of the earth for the power to reclaim their souls from the web of Fate, a few becoming seduced by the promise in the oldest, darkest, most forbidden of magics, using the Godlike abilities granted them to retrieve their soul from the Shadow Plane, only to have that soul broken, and fragmented, the missing pieces a sacrifice to the darkest powers, one that elicits a bond unbreakable even through death, shackling the user forever to the servitude of the magics, making them immortal and damn near invincible.


I've had little time to devote to my artwork or my writing, what with school (god, If I'd have known that Chemistry and Biology majors had so much freaking homework I would have rethought what I wanted to do with my life...) having started again. I spend the majority of my time not at work studying and quizzing myself. Seriously. With my majors, the sheer amount of basic information you have to memorize and be able to instantaneously recall just to be able to FUNCTION at ALL in your classes is insane, so I've had to actually start *studying*. Reading extra books, extra research and doing practice work, and this is when I'm NOT in class, during time when I used to eat, sleep, or be creative. All my self-assigned work being in addition to the heavy homework load that I *have* to do. This is the first year in my whole life's education where I've had to make any effort outside of school on learning and understanding what is being taught. It's not enough to pay attention to the lectures, and have notes. I take good, detailed notes but most of time they're of no use to me since you're expected to know everything off the top of your head, and not only restricted to Lab assignments where you can't have your textbooks and notes, but in lectures as well. Most of my professors only give you like 3/4 of a sec. max. to answer a question correctly before they verbally embarrass you in front of your classmates, or casually drop various percentages from your grade merely for needing A COUPLE OF SECONDS TO THINK ABOUT THE QUESTION AND FORM A PROPER RESPONSE!!! It doesn't matter if it's a new and completely foreign subject on which you've had no experience or knowledge. In the advanced courses you're expected to be versed in data at least three weeks ahead of the lesson plan, and to know everything about it, down to the most minute, and relevant detail. It's just so exhausting.

Don't get me wrong, I love the subjects of my classes, and I love learning new things and gaining new knowledge, and I love doing Labs and having the tools to form my own theories and properly test them, but I'm not at all convinced anymore that what I'm gaining is worth all of the stress and headaches. Kris suggested that I drop a class, and get transferred out of my all Honors and AP course schedule to the regular classes. While that would make my life a whole lot less hellish, I just don't think I could willingly give up all of the effort and work I've poured into my studies thus far, even for my own well-being and sanity. I feel like I have an obligation to myself to succeed in the hardest classes available, and it's not that I struggle because I'm not smart enough- I am, thank god, otherwise I would have been humiliated by my professors so many more times by now, not to mention horrified to the point of suicide at my own intellectual deficiency- or determined enough, it's just that I so severely miss all of the things in my life I've had to give up or all together miss in order to keep up with the work, and maintain a high grade (I've got straight A's right now, but I'm sure that by the middle of the semester my two A-'s are going to drop to B's, and my A+'s are going to become A's or A-'s....). And I'm tired. Physically and mentally. I can handle my body being run down, but my emotions are a chaotic, unpredictable mess, and my perception has been seriously compromised. My brain has a hard time processing information that doesn't concern Scientific data or equations with any success, and the part of my mental facilities that is typically dedicated to writing or drawing is getting it's signals mixed with other parts of my mental processes and as a result I find myself fixating on the collection of ignored and discarded ideas and information at inappropriate times. Like while driving through rush hour traffic on my motorcycle and getting completely distracted by an idea for a drawing, and focusing on the details of that picture rather than to riding my bike safely or paying any attention whatsoever to the road. I got a traffic ticket three days ago because I spaced out so thoroughly that I ceased to consciously control my driving and sped through two redlights, a stop sign, and was driving 55 mph in a 15 mph school zone, all without any notice or care. The officer who pulled me over told me he had been following me with his lights and siren on for almost 10 minutes, and I kept on going without any indication of having aknowledged him. He got my attention a block from my house when I passed a car with loud radio that woke me up, and I pulled over. Not at all good, and that's not even the only time I've been too preoccupied with my characters and their lives to function outside of my own thoughts and fantasies in a situation where mental presence is crucial.

It's getting to the point where I just can't make myself put a whole lot of effort into the work like I did last semester and at the beginning of this semester. I used to do every single assignment with the single-minded focus of getting the maximum amount of points available, and presenting my very best work, even on the optional extra-credit work. I used to study every single day for at least 3 hours (unless my work schedule or a catastrophic personal event -like my mother-in-law having a severe heart attack- prevented it), and on top of those three hours was homework, and however long it would take for me to copy my handwritten notes and observations from class to a text document on my PC, for easier reference and study.

I have a friend who is in my Anatomy and Physiology class that used to be in my Advanced Chem 2 class that got moved to regular Chem 2 because he couldn't maintain the required B overall average on his classroom and homework assignments(he had a B- average because he missed the deadline on a single paper -when you don't turn it in on time 50% of the grade for the work is automatically deducted) and because he missed ONE freaking Lab due to illness (he was in the hospital with pneumonia)and wasn't able to make it up within a week's time (which is all the time we're allotted to make up a Lab before we get an F on it, even if we have an ironclad excuse). According to him, the regular Chem 2 class is like a freaking cakewalk compared to the AP class, and he currently has an A+ in it. Very little homework, only 2 Labs a month (and you apparently have 3 weeks to make it up if you miss it, longer if you have a valid excuse), and you can use your notes on exams and on classwork. AND the teacher isn't condescending and just plain vindictive if you answer a question incorrectly, or take a little while to come up with said answer. It all sounds utterly heavenly compared to the most light of my workloads, but he said that the downside is the material being taught. To use his words, "it's child's play". Non-AP Chem 2 is like a very basic, and easy review of stuff that you covered in high school Chemistry. I sat in on one of the classes to see if it was as bad as he said, and it was actually *worse*. They were only just discussing the Periodic Table of Elements, something that I've known since 8th grade Science. A three and a half hour class was devoted ONLY to the Periodic Table, AND they weren't expected to memorize it. The professor gave each student a color handout of the Table along with a freaking pamphlet of facts about the information, and a key to show which abbreviation indicated what chemical. AND IT WAS TO USE ON THEIR ASSIGNMENTS AND EXAMS!!!!! I will not pay to take a class in which I will never learn anything new and spend my periods ignoring the lectures, not doing my work because it's on a subject I've already completely covered, and has become boring as a result. I didn't enroll in college to go over things I know and understand from high school, I enrolled to gain new knowledge and skills. Chem 2 may be pathetically easy, the same with all of the regular classes, but if I have to choose between getting an easy A by studying familar, substandard material, or working my ass off to the point of borderline psychosis in my attempts to grasp, memorize, apply, and learn every single aspect and iota of info on a new subject, I'd rather work till I'm dead, thank you very much.

Work has changed somewhat for me, for the best, I think. During the the messiest and most painful period of my recovery from my motorcycle accident I had to drop most of my hours, and 3 out of 4 of my classes due to the nature of my injuries in contrast to the very physical nature of teaching Kickboxing, so during that time I took up several private clients who wanted a personal trainer with Boxing,Kickboxing,Self-Defense, and (some, though now that I'm taking professional Tae Kwon Do, and Jujitsu classes on a regular basis, I'm able to instruct with a much larger degree of confidence and skill) Martial Arts experience, in addition to the prerequisite fitness and strength-building background. Being a personal trainer pays a whole lot more than my classes do, despite the ratio of students in my classes (anywhere from 8-14 students per class, three times a week for each class, for 2 hours per class) to 5 individuals who get my undivided attention and guidance (3 of them twice a week, and 2 of them one night a week, for 1 1/2 to 2 hours per session). It doesn't seem fair for the private clients to pay so much more for a considerably less amount of time just for one-on-one guidance, when I work just as hard, sometimes harder, with each individual in my public classes (they all get one-on-one time with me as well, plus the benefits of a fullscale classroom "lesson" -I don't have a better word for it-, and peers to spar with and learn from in turn). I honestly don't know if they're paying an exhorbitant amount to learn privately for the slightly more individualized training regiment, the completely private room where I teach the exercises and scheduled time -no waiting in lines- with the equipment (so no else, aside from myself can see them do the routines, workout, and possibly make an ass of themselves, perhaps?), or if it's just because they assume that since they get my full attention during our time together that they'll learn more efficiently, more quickly, and just overall be better than those who take part in my classes and learn with others? I can't think of any plausible reason why the Gym charges more for a private trainer (and pays me a whole lot more for the position), when they essentially learn less, and get less experience and skill than the average student in my classes. When I got my first paycheck after taking on the first 2 private students, I was blown away by the drastic increase in my salary, so I was curious enough to ask one of my clients just how much they paid for my services, and I swear my jaw dropped to the floor. Apparently, they pay by the hour ($45 more an hour-on top of the already ridiculous price- if they schedule their time for Fri.,Sat., or Sun., or during the evening or late night hours-we're open 24/7), plus extra fees for the room and equipment use, AND they have to pay something like $300 more a year for their Gym membership (it's called the "Platinum Club" *snorts* And you have to be a "platinum member" to even qualify for a personal trainer provided by the Gym, it's a prerequisite ). For my public class, students pay for 6 months of lessons at a time, and it's a very reasonable amount since it covers their Gym membership for that time, use of the all of the Gym's fitness equipment, in-class refreshments, protective gear, and free entry into all of the Gym, Local, and State Kickboxing tournaments (if that student has been given the okay to participate from me, that is). Sure all of my private clients are adults far beyond their prime, but I have a class specifically for Beginners, ages 21 and over.

Oh well. I may think that my clients are getting screwed, but I'm sure as hell not going to complain. One-on-one lessons are so much easier to give than a full class, and I'm making over 3x more than what I made just teaching my 4 classes, just from adding 5 people. My manager has listed my name in the Gym-published bi-monthly fitness guide as a private trainer accepting clients, along with a resume of sorts detailing my work record within the Ozarks fitness community, all of my "formal" training (the classes I took to learn boxing, kickboxing, and martial arts myself ) and qualifications. At my request he included a short description of what I expect of my clients, and an outline of what they will learn from me. I got a call this morning for my services, and I'll be meeting with potential client no. 6 Friday afternoon, for the "interview" (where they decide if they can handle the lessons, and I decide if I can tolerate their company without hurting them. ^^ So far, so good. ).

So, as you can see from the above, I haven't had much time to do anything on DA. More time spent on school, and now more time spent on my job. *sigh* Eventually I may get caught up with my messages and get back to all of my friends, but I'm positive that this won't happen anytime soon.

Okay, so I hope everyone is well.

-Marie