I'm officially releasing @GregariousTree into the wild. He assured me that he is equipped with both a Bulbasaur and a Wooden Sword, so I have no reservations. I can take on two adoptees now. You know, if those still exist.

Finally got around to posting the latest Writing Contest results. >.> Our winner was first-time entrant @GregariousTree, who blew us all away with his haunting poem! Check it out: (Hidden Content)

The Zelda Universe Writing Contest, October 2018: RESULTS! Gah, sorry for the delay in this announcement! Life has been...hectic for me. Anyway, as you can probably tell from the fact that it's now November, the October Writing Contest owarimashita. (It...it's over. That's what that means.) Said contest's theme was the overly depressing Guilt, for which I still blame logicalpencils, one of August's winners. Turnout was low this time—I'm going to be taking steps to promote these things more aggre…

Oh, and in case you missed it because I unintentionally bumped the original announcement back a page in here, we are starting sign-ups for a brand-new special event! We at the Creative Corner are teaming up with @Ruki and @epixtar over in the Role Play Guild for an unprecedented collaborative competition! For details, check out the information thread. Sign-ups will last all of November, and the event will take place throughout December. Disclaimer: It's not actually a tournament—there are no bra…

So in my World Music class, we're about to start working on our last paper, which is a simplified autoethnography, and to get us thinking along those lines, we had to write a ~600-word piece that relates one of the metaphors we used in our previous paper to our lives. The original metaphor I repurposed was "Japanese Music as Time Capsule." The result blew my mind when I read the whole thing after I was done. I guess I can still surprise myself when I write something fairly deep while feeling ext…

This thing is over! Results coming later today!

Vote in the October Writing Contest now! ~20 minutes remain! I'm about 3/4 through my short story "Now & Then." I'm really pleased with it. It's not particularly exciting, but it's an interesting experiment in framing. And one of the protagonists is interesting and three-dimensional. (The other protagonist is more two-dimensional, but that's okay because he just frames the meat of the story.) It's not exactly like the vision for a television pilot that it is based on, but it's a fascinating real…

That's okay; I mix them up, too. I see a post by Realm and think to myself, "You know, I don't remember writing that post." And then I figure it out.

Just sent this email to my parents, with a BCC to my best friend and to the diversity person/mentor at my school: (Hidden Content)

Hello, writers, both seasoned and new! Be on the lookout for a very special event to be announced this week! Also, our first special appeal for feedback is drawing to a close, and the CreCo feedback thread will disappear for a while once November arrives. So please leave any feedback and suggestions you have for the board there if you haven't yet done so! (Note that we always accept feedback for the board, either directly or in this thread. We'll just have occasional "special appeals" for feedba…

I'm writing a scene in my story that comes straight from my life in middle school, from which I still regularly experience post-traumatic stress, primarily in the form of dreams/nightmares. I'm determined to get this scene over with as quickly as possible while still making it poignant. The goal of this particular scene is to shine an unflattering light on hypermasculinity. It's not violent or anything—thank goodness—but it's still unpleasant to relive as I put it down in writing. I actually sta…

Finally hit 2700 words in my current story. I started it almost three months ago; this is taking a while. ...Says the one who spent three years on a 7000-word story.

Someone said Nebby. Nebby is best Derp-Cloud.

Voting for this month's Writing Contest is live! Have fun, kids! Forgot to mention: voting ends after Tuesday.

The Zelda Universe Writing Contest, October 2018: Voting! It's finally that time again! You've waited two whole months to cast some votes in a ZU Writing Contest, and I am honored to reward you for your patience! This time around, the theme is Guilt, which has yielded two pieces born of despair. (Blame our August winners...) One is a deep poem with rich imagery that will give you chills, the other a fan-short that puts a much darker spin on the ending of Skyward Sword. Both are examples of the f…

The day got away from me! Voting on the Writing Contest will start Wednesday at latest. Hopefully tomorrow, if I can find the time. EDIT: I'll definitely have time on Wednesday, Also, it's a To-Do in my Habitica tasks.

I just finished watching "Rosa" about 10 minutes ago, and I'm still reeling. (Vague spoilers ahead.) Only one other episode of television has caused me to cry so far, and that was "The Angels Take Manhattan." But this was happy-crying. So beautiful, so powerful. Such a wonderful tribute to one of the most wonderful women and one of the most wonderful activists who ever lived. I loved the interactions between Ryan and Rosa—can we also discuss how convincing Vinette's accent was?—and almost starte…

Alrighty, folks. The submission period is now over, with a total of two entries submitted. Voting thread will be up by midnight EDT.

Okay, I'm having a mild anxiety attack now because the U.S. government has announced that it is seriously considering changing the legal definition of gender to erase transgender people completely. I'm horrified, offended, and appalled. I've hated this country's government for a very long time, but I have now lost all faith in it. I even dreamed last night about how much I hate republics—not Republicans; republics, as in the pseudo-democratic system of government that the U.S. doesn't like to ad…

^Sorry I didn't see this until now! I have received one more entry, but if, say, you and one other person were to request an extension, I'd be okay with that. It's always more interesting when there are more than two entries.

Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon is phenomenal so far. I like how the first mansion is so much smaller than Luigi's Mansion, since all of the backtracking and relatively slow movement is my biggest peeve with the first game. I love the new mechanics, too. And the humor is top-notch. And E. Gadd—I'm upset that they revealed what his first initial is short for—is even more delightful. Is it possible to adopt old people? Because I want to adopt E. Gadd.

Thanks for the kind words! They're seriously hindering me at this point. I basically take one look at this Word document, and my heart starts pounding. I'm on meds for this, too, so it could actually be much worse: prior to starting the meds, I would have crippling gut pain on a regular basis from stress arising from homework.

If any of you missed the GameCube because you're a whipper-snapper who was born in the 21st century, you should get the 3DS remake of Luigi's Mansion because it's fantastic. I mean, it's a pretty lackluster remake, but the graphics are excellent and the game is as wonderful and as darkly hilarious as ever. And having the map on the bottom screen is so, so helpful. And the new achievements add a little, welcome spice to things. That said, the game is still really short and probably not worth the …

Gah, I'm so anxious about this Japanese oral exam on Thursday and this World Music paper due on Friday. I did so much avoiding today that I got basically nothing done outside of going to classes, meals, and work. It's reminiscent of my old habits which practically destroyed my life a few years ago. I know I'm not spiralling or regressing or anything—I know I'll do fine—but it's still off-putting and an additional source of stress. Plus, this anxiety is awful. I semi-consciously picked at my cuti…

If I could eat these, I'd totally go for them. Because they sound delicious. Except for the oil and soap part.

For those who were frustrated that the ZUCast wasn't available on major podcatchers, fear not! Now available on Google Play Music Now available on Stitcher Now available on Apple Podcasts

Here's a friendly reminder that entries are due 6 days from now! I have one entry so far, though one entry does not a contest make.

zeldauniverse.net/forums/Attac…22d8bd93b7c0fb40ed3198eca This is Espurr, a rescue whose deadname is Rebecca lol. She's a 3-year-old Russian Blue who arrived at our house from Tennessee—we live in Pennsylvania—about 2.75 hours ago. She's really freaked out right now, but we're doing all we can to make her feel safe and comfortable in her new home. We're going to introduce her to our blob-cat (and vice versa) gradually so they're not traumatizing each other. Yay for Psychic Cat!

Sorry for the sudden change of theme—Dunsparce will be back—but... Check the ZU homepage at 9 AM EDT (or afterwards) for a present.

That's so manipulative lol. Welcome to all the new members! I remember when I was a new member. I was almost 13. And I only joined because I'd heard the first ZCast episode by accident while looking for a Zelda podcast, and the hosts made this place sound amazing. Best accident ever! ...I feel old now.

That's horrific, and you know it. Dunsparce is perfect the way it is: a cuddly coward who's the size of a 12-year-old human.

After honoring Meltan for being new and then finding out that it's a Pokémon GO exclusive that I'll never get my hands on, I've decided to switch my theme to a different species of Pokémon. Now, I'm giving some love to Dunsparce, that one species you forgot existed. No one remembers Dunsparce. Why? I dunno. Could be that it's never been easy to come across. Could be that it was last featured in an episode of the anime that aired over 15 years ago. Whatever the reason may be, I always feel bad fo…

Just popping in to say that Kirby is my favorite boingy. Also, I appreciate your appreciation posts, @BackSet-Chan.

Quote from Colu: “holidays in general annoy me, to be honest. i could just be cynical though ” I'm actually the same way. Holidays disrupt the flow of daily life, even in small and/or aesthetic ways. Like, I'm sick of Halloween. And I get deeply depressed after Halloween, too, because that's when Christmas crap starts coming out to remind me that my family is a minority in this country and that Hanukkah apparently doesn't matter enough to mention. And I have to put up with that for 2.5 months ou…

Quote from BackSet-Chan: “I'm not exactly that into writing romance but is there a name for a pairing of a quiet anti-social guy and a quiet shy girl? ” I wasn't aware that there were names for pairing types. Interesting! In other news, I thought I would announce that the first episode of the new incarnation of the ZUCast is complete, and it was supposed to come out today! We ran into some trouble with posting it to the main site, however. Fingers crossed for a release tomorrow!

I don't understand how there isn't already a Doctor Who thread. Instead of making a big post from the get-go explaining my whole history with the series...I'm really making this now because I want to discuss the Series 11 opener! (Spoilers are fair game; however, please put potential Series 11 spoilers in spoiler tags for now. If you don't want to be spoiled, just be careful.) For those of you have seen The Woman Who Fell to Earth, which premiered today worldwide, what did you think? Personally,…

Quote from Keyaki: “Quote from EzloSpirit: “I'm neutrois. ” Well that's a new term I never heard of. What's it mean? ” There's actually a whole website dedicated to educating the masses, so feel free to be educated!

I want a boyfriend. </3

Holy crap, that's incredible! Your attention to detail in that drawing is spectacular!

On a different note, ZU's official Writing Contest is back after taking a month off! The theme is "Guilt," and entries are due by the 21st. I hope you'll join us in the Creative Corner for some friendly competition!