Ramblings and Musings of the Insane, Philosophical Ladybug

So last night I watched The Bogus Books and then took a nap. I had some weird but fairly pleasant dream that involved a big house and Gene Torg talking on a phone in a room in the basement. He seemed to be staying there while he was recovering from something. Pearl Chute was around too, but I can't remember if I "was" Pearl or if she was separate. It almost seems like she was separate, and I was going in the basement to check on Gene. I remember lots of boxes and green and blue carpets.

Now I really want to put Gene Torg and Pearl Chute into the next Perry mystery, tentatively titled The Nefarious Necklace. The current idea is that they would have the titular object at first and discover that the thing's possessed when Pearl tries it on. Gene has a terrible struggle getting it away from her, once he realizes it's responsible for her behavior.

The problem is, somehow I got the parallel image in my mind of that Pokemon episode where Jessie puts on a mask and is corrupted. And now I can't stop thinking and worrying that if I try to write the scene with Gene and Pearl, it's going to sound like that episode and they're going to sound like Team Rocket.

It's a ridiculous worry, really. Gene and Pearl are nothing like Team Rocket. The only similarity is that they're on the shady side, too. Or they were; they're trying to go straight in the story. Otherwise, they're extremely affectionate with each other (although they claim to be friends and nothing else) and neither one of them ever acts like an idiot. (I love James, but he really does act nutty sometimes. And not even just James, if we're talking the episodes around seasons 5 and 6. The whole lot of them were written like complete idiots for a while. Even James was never that bad before that point.)

And the Pokemon episode handled things silly, if I remember right, despite the creepiness of being possessed by a mask. My story would be stark serious and dangerous; Gene would end up trying to fight Pearl off because she would attack him once he tried to remove the necklace.

There shouldn't be any parallel whatsoever.

But the image is still there, stuck in my head.

And the very thought of the scenes being similar is feeling very, very weird and wrong.

**headdesk.**

Yesterday we finally got to take my aunt down to Salem with us to look around and have a picnic. We've been trying to do that for months and stuff just kept coming up. >___>;;; So we browsed around, saw some nice houses, and some kitties. X3 I even think one of them was a Ragdoll. It walked across the street and into a yard we were parked in front of. It was cute! Then we also saw a Calico, and a gray cat curled up in a "cat ball" on someone's porch.

Afterward we went to the Taylorsville Wal-Mart. They bought the building where Home Base used to be, and they're making a humungeous Super Wal-Mart there. They're going to tear down the original one soon, and use that space for parking. ><; That's really annoying. In some ways, I prefer the original Wal-Mart to the Super ones. The Taylorsville one almost always has had better selections of stuff than the Super ones. If that changes when it goes Super, I'll be really ticked off. XD;

And here is a quiz thingie.

1. Favourite scent: Hmmm. Food cooking. XD

2. Favourite way to relax: Saturday mornings watching TV, role-playing/writing/drawing hurt/comfort stuffs, shopping for things I like.

3. Favourite movie you own: Just one movie? -___-; **thinks.** I really don't own any movies unless I love them. I'll pick the extended Return of the King.

4. Favourite movie you don't already own: Star Wars Episode III, The Cat Returns

5. Favourite male movie stars: Ewan McGregor, Liam Neeson, Elijah Wood, Sean Astin

6. Favourite female movie stars: Carrie Fisher, Liv Tyler.... Anyone noticing a pattern here? XD; Really, I don't watch very many movies any more, hence, my fave live-action stars are mostly from Star Wars and LOTR. I also like certain voice actors.

7. Favourite book genre: Manga (especially magical girls stuff and some action/shounen series), Mystery, Star Wars (that's a genre all its own!). I don't like Sci-Fi in general, so I didn't want to put that.

8. Favourite clothing store: Ehhh.... Not into fashion. Down with fashion!

9. Favourite non-clothing store: Borders, Barnes & Noble, Media Play, Toys R Us, Wal-Mart

10. Favourite cartoon character: I don't like American cartoons much anymore either. **thinks.** I like Starfire, Raven, and Robin on Teen Titans. And I like The Joker on The Batman. Really, he seems to offer the show's most intriguing insights. For a nutcase, he's really philosophical sometimes. I also like Flora and Bloom on Winx Club.

11. Favourite CD you own: ... My Japanese anime soundtracks. And the Star Wars and LOTR soundtracks.

12. Favourite CD you don't already own: How I do know if it'll be a favorite CD if I don't own it? Well, actually, there are a couple. -.-; I want the first American Sailor Moon soundtrack. **has the music from the other two.** I checked the first one out from the library, but I can't find it to buy anymore. ;__; Every time it turned up at Media Play, I didn't have the money.

13. Pass the torch and tag five of your LJ friends!:

amanechan

roene

kit_black

hatori_sama

dai_atlas

It's interesting.... There was a stretch of time when I wasn't watching anything on Saturday mornings. That was because there was nothing on that I was much interested in. XD; I think that went from about 1996 or 7 to 2002. There was a slump in Saturday morning TV show quality during that time. Also, if this makes sense, for a while I felt like, in the realm of entertainment/media, that I was wandering about, confused and lost. XD; That started to change in 2001, when I rediscovered my love of certain Disney shows (such as Darkwing Duck, Talespin, and DuckTales), and it really changed completely the following year when I found YGO and anime. I feel as though I've graduated from American cartoons and that now I need something bigger and better to whet my appetite. Anime does that for me.

There's only a few non-Japanese cartoons that are mature enough to occupy my attention and interest. I think the reason is this: I'm more serious now, and I need stuff that's more serious/intelligent to watch. A lot of American shows don't meet this criteria for me, because they're too light-hearted and ridiculous. There's also some Japanese shows that are often dumb too (Ultimate Muscle and the recent seasons of Pokémon come to mind), but the majority of Japanese shows seem to be good, while the majority of American cartoons seem to be stupid. Or maybe I'm just not exposed to very many of the really good ones. ^^;

I'm just getting really tired of the American cartoon clichés (which, admittedly, are occasionally present in Japanese shows too). Even the best American cartoons have such clichés. Jackie Chan has them, in the ways that Valmont and Daolon Wong have been dealt with in their later appearances. In one episode, it ended with Valmont being wrapped up in a package and shipped off to Mexico. That is STUPID. It doesn't serve as a real-life solution to the problem he was causing. That's just a typical cartoon resolution of the type that's been overdone for years. **mushrooom sigh.** The problems caused by Team Rocket on Pokémon are solved in a similar manner. There's no reason why, even though the shows are aimed at children, the shows have to be so annoyingly dumbed down like that.

And speaking of Team Rocket.... What has happened to such wonderful characters? They're being shredded to pieces by the writers. The Team Rocket I used to know doesn't even seem to exist anymore. They're brainless wimps! Someone I know called them The Three Stooges recently, and I have to agree. The writers took characters that had awesome potential and have ruined them. I eventually stopped watching Pokémon because I couldn't bear to see such idiocy from the characters who brought me into the show in the first place. The last time they showed any backbone or brains was when they were trying to protect their Pokémon near the start of season 6! And I was very surprised by that episode, since they'd already been going downhill before that. **shakes head.** Team Rocket got killed and they were replaced by brainless clones! XD;