ZeroHero

A gift card for Barnes & Noble which I used on Discord's Apple by Carrie Vaughn (Yeah, "Discord" is what caught my eye because of FiM, but I read the summary and it sounds pretty interesting - and the clerk made a comment about it being very good when I checked out so I'm looking forward to starting it tonight), The Magician's Guild by Trudi Canavan, and volumes 2 and 3 of Karakuridoji Ultimo by Stan Lee and Hiroyuki Takei. Wish I could've gone home this year, but I at least called everyone up. Otherwise, I didn't really do much of anything to celebrate Christmas this year (and snow doesn't even exist in Southern California - it still feels like summer for crying out loud T^T). How about everyone else?

You quoted my post and said that. Thought you were talking about that specifically.

Note: If you don't want to read through a wall of text that's basically a pointless rant, turn back now. I just felt the need to share, especially since people tend to just post rants about the negatives in their lives. As lame as it sounds, this was a huge success for me. I ran into someone I'll occassionally talk to at work and decided on impulse to invite him to a comic store because I knew he likes Magic the Gathering. Luck was with me yesterday as he agreed to go and I was about to get us there smoothly (San Diego's big, it's easy to mess up with the different bus routes and such ;P). We ended up hanging out at the store, cracked open a couple boxes (yeah, full boxes) of booster packs, went to a Pizza Hut, and ended up playing around for the rest of the night. Nothing special, your typical hanging out stuff - but this is the first time in my 20 year old life that I have ever hung out with someone and felt completely comfortable and myself the whole time - something I've only ever experienced with my siblings and I've been struggling to do with others ever since I moved away from home nearly two years ago. Granted, this isn't my first "friend" in the sense that I've always had people that I've just clicked with and could talk to about anything, but he is the first friend I have ever made in my life that I can hang out with and enjoy what I enjoy. I had been significantly trying to be more social for about the past eight months, talking and hanging out with many different people, whether I was interested in what they were doing or not - and even when I did hang out around people who liked Yugioh and Magic (my prime interests, aside from writing and drawing). However, no matter who it was or what we were doing, I would always feel uncomfortable and withdraw - as in consciously. I would literally just zone everything out and get lost in my own world, becoming totally unresponsive to those around me. Not saying that last night just totally wiped that part of me out, but it was significant victory for me. I've been gloom and doom about being a hopeless loner for particularly the past eight months or so and I've finally taken a huge step in the right direction and accomplished something I've never been able to do my entire life. Hopefully I'll be able to really build on this for the months and years to come.

Dang, you guys are being too analytical - just choose who you like naturally without having to think about it. xP As for me, RD is the most fun to watch for me, so I pick her, followed closely by AJ for the same reason (heck, episode 4 was the turning point for me becoming a brony - I was about to drop it after the first 3).

If you've seen my art, then you know my answer is RD by a landslide, followed by AJ and Twilight. These three have more "loosely" styled hair, I guess you could say, so there's room to play around with it for effects in my drawings. Pinkie's, Rarity's, and Fluttershy's, which are more "bound" to a particular style, giving them a few more rules than the other half, I guess. Outside of my opinions regarding drawing their hair, I don't really care, personally - but I still kind of have a thing against Pinkie's, Rarity's, and Fluttershy's. Maybe I'm just biased because they're the more girly half, imo? >.<

Nope, it wasn't you. I'm male and he was in uniform onboard the ship - so if you're not in the Navy and I'm not female, that incident couldn't have been us. xP

Eh, I voted "From most people." It's kind of a trick question. I don't "hide" that I'm a brony because I do use FiM wallpapers, wear one of the shirts, and draw the characters but most of the time people have no clue that it's MLP, oddly enough. If they do ask, I'll either them that it is MLP if I'm relatively close to them. Otherwise, I'll just kinda talk about it as a meme without directly calling it MLP since I don't exactly want to explain to someone who I don't know anyway why I like FiM. While no one seems to really catch on to the wallpapers or drawings, I had a few interesting reactions to the shirt with a silhouette of Rainbow Dash that says "This Shirt Just Got 20 Percent Cooler." Oddly enough, I got a brohoof from another brony within the first five minutes of the wearing the shirt, lol. Other than that, I've had a couple guesses as to what it's supposed to mean. One person figured it to be a clever pun considering that it's winter, hence a T-shirt would be "cooler" this time of year (I had to hold back the urge to laugh at that one and just agreed with him xD). Another just seemed kinda flustered. "How is your shirt 20% percent cooler? Is it because there's a unicorn on it or something?" I just said "yup" and walked on. Thinking back I should've just looked him in the eye straight and completely serious and say "It means I'm gay" just to see how he'd respond, lol. And finally today, I was walking around downtown wearing it and a hobo (at least that's how he looked anyway) walked by me, smiled and said "Love and tolerance." It was kind of odd yet somehow neat to meet a fan of the show who was possibly homeless (although if you're homeless, how would you have the means to follow it anyway - maybe he just liked dressing in beatup clothes?). So yeah, oddly enough this stuff seems to be inconspicious since the only people I've met who recognized it for what it is is were actualy bronies - everyone else seems clueless. That or the ones who do know what it is just decide to keep quiet - which is fine by me anyway, I get no grief for it either way.

Wait, the ponies were hiding? They weren't doing a very good job. D: But yeah, friends on Skype had avatars. For about a month I thought they were just part of some big troll until I found a thread in which they were legitimately discussing the show. You know the rest.

Don't quote me on this one, but I'm guessing it has something to do with the fact that the official VA's are legally bound to whoever produces the show via contracts that the company pays for. For example, the legal rights to Pokemon shifted companies years ago and the entire cast was changed because 4Kids didn't sell the original VA's contracts to the new company or something like that.

*bump* So, taking Chocodemon's advice, I've been doing quick sketches of vectors from the show. Surprisingly, it's helping a lot - I'm starting to notice small details I didn't before so when I start drawing custom poses again they should be a bit better anyway. http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P171211_0424.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P171211_0551.jpg Using copic markers for the first time and realized they definitely aren't colored pencils to say the least, lol. I'm gonna need to learn how to really use these things because they're a whole new ballgame for me. `^^ http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2114.jpg Practicing a bunch of different poses from vectors again. A few of them didn't seem to follow the "rules" I thought I had established with the two colored sketches above, so I guess I need to keep pushing and figure these guys out. Here's individual close ups of each sketch in the order they were drawn: http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2114_02.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2115_04.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2115_03.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2115_02.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2114_01.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2114_01.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2115.jpg http://i863.photobucket.com/albums/ab199/ZeroHero_03/P181211_2115_05.jpg

As it sounds this is a recurring problem, even if you ignore him or laugh with him (unless you actually show him that he's upsetting you, in which case try ignoring him for a while). Better than letting him know you're upset, talking to someone - parents, siblings, friends, teachers, your paster or another member of your church. You definitely need some outlet to vent out your feelings in this situation. If the problem doesn't solve itself, you might need to approach him and let him know how your feel and try to talk it over with him - find out what's going on in his mind as well and why he does this. Try spending more time with him as well - do something both of you enjoy. Maybe try to teach him something you're talented in that he might be interested in learning - or vice verse, try and get involved in one of his hobbies. Try and put together family game nights - friendly competition brings people closer as well. At the same time, spend enough time away from him as well - being together too often can especially raise tension between them. Try and improve on personal activities you're good at - maybe you like writing or you're a competitive swimmer - anything that makes you feel better about yourself. Encourage and support him whenever possible as well. If he's involved in a choir or perhaps participating in a sport or other sort of competition, go and watch him and congratulate him on what he does well. You're getting beat down by his bullying and as it sounds like he's having a tough time getting on his own feet. Sounds like the key is for both of you to feel better about yourselves as well as each other - if you're upset with your own self you're only going to make things worse for those around you. Adding on negatives only digs you deeper into the hole.

I haven't re-watched every episode yet, but I'm working on it. I'll typically re-watch about three or four episodes a week or two, whenever I feel like watching it. But yeah, you're right it does get boring after too much, which is why I end up spreading it out so much - the time off tends to make it "fresh" again for me when I come back to it, lol. But this is true for everything though. P.S. - OP didn't answer his own question. ;P

I had a small collection of Carebears videos but my memory of them is too fuzzy to think of anything specific about them. Was there an actual TV series or just movies they came out with now and then? I know I used to watch Spider-Man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Street Sharks when I was real young - again too long ago to remember them clearly. I watched Pokemon for about five years, I guess (if each season was a year long - I watched up to early Advanced). Watched Rugrats with my sister before going to school for years. The first two generations of Digimon (that show's still going, isn't it? I keep seeing new Digimon stuff pop up every now and then). Ed, Edd, n Eddy and Teen Titans were big between my siblings and I for a couple years while I was in high school. I guess that's about it. I really wasn't one to watch TV all that much. Recently I've just been watching random anime titles that seem interesting. Currently I'm watching Case Closed and before that I also saw YuYu Hakusho and Full Metal Alchemist. After Case Closed, I'm leaning toward DBZ Kai.

I voted "No, I could care less." Although, I would like to read a good hurt and comfort fic between RD and AJ. Because of how competitive they are in cannon, I think it'd be cute as long as it isn't too excessive (i.e. they start going out or confessing feelings or whatever else). Anyway, I don't care to read romance shippings, but I do enjoy when a shipping is implied through occasional jokes or embarrassing moments throughout a story, especially when the shipping is onesided with the other side being completely clueless. Primary example would be RedxYellow in Pokemon Special.

Well, unless she actually knows about FiM and its fandom using those terms, I'm sure she'd see it as an honest mistake and not give it any thought - it'd get a laugh out of me at best but it wouldn't make me wonder how it came about. I agree.

The holidays have changed for me over my lifetime, unfortunately for the worst. When I was real young, my entire family would get together for the holidays (cousins, aunts, uncles, great aunts and uncles, grandparents, great grandparents, you name it - EVERYONE) - some of my favorite childhood memories ever - I had a cousin who was always big on NES games (damn, not only do I feel old now but I haven't seen this guy in forever D: ) and one of my uncles had this huge playful dog that I absolute loved. That tradition blew over when my grandma started suffering Alzheimer's (she was always the one who organized this) and now I haven't seen a lot of my family in over a decade I bet. In fact, I probably wouldn't even recognize them now, sadly. I was so young when I last saw some of them - probably 7 or 8 at best. Another tradition that is long dead now was when my grandparents from my father's side came to visit, we would go out and see Christmas decorations in one of our bigger neighboring cities. Sadly, some of the best decorators of that time have slowly quit going over the top because money is tight now and people just don't want to use up gas (my family included) to come from all over the place to see them anymore. Stupid money. T_T As of late, we've typically just stuck with putting up the tree on Thanksgiving weekend and baking cookies a few times. Although our most recent pastors at church are awesome and put on the greatest Christmas services I have ever seen - so at least that's one good memory in my more recent Christmases for lack of the ones I've lost from long ago. This year's going to be a bit different for me since I'm not taking leave to go home this year (I took an unexpected trip in September that I'm going to have to make up for during the holidays so I can afford a family vacation this summer) so I'm on my own in California while the rest of my family is up in Minnesota. Hopefully some of my new friends won't be too busy or at least be willing to take me in so I don't feel too lonely this year. Got to keep my head high and discover new traditions!