Currents of Time

What is this entry even really for? I DON'T KNOW. That is my disclaimer and your warning.

So, anyway, hey, I was clicking around YouTube, as you do, from one of the videos in the last entry, and ended up tripping my way to the FFXIV theme song. It's called "Answers" and is sung by Susan Calloway. I was familiar with the name, but I hadn't placed her as the singer in the clips I'd heard before. (They play a short bit of it during your intro, no matter which town you choose. The whole WALK FREEEEE bit, for those of you who witnessed the picture spam.) I'd been rather unimpressed, really, but that might've just been the repetition getting to me. Now that I've heard the whole thing, I find I rather like the song.

Except it is kind of not so great at being The Song for the game! Which is kind of disappointing! Maybe it will make more sense once they add in a storyline (BE FAIR THERE IS A STORY it is just rather a bit scattered and you haven't seen much of it). And, as far as I know so far, they never actually play the whole song. Final Fantasy XI's main song (well, I suppose there are two of them, now) was played in its entirety in the game's opening, and because of that (and probably in part because they actually say Vana'diel in it a few times), it's very much FFXI's song for me. (Said opening video. Or, if you'd rather just the song, click this one. The former has the benefit of including the lyrics and their translation - it's sung in Esperanto. OR, they're also up on SongMeanings.) (Memoro de la Stono's melody pops up all over the place, actually, though you only hear the lyrics in the opening movie.) And the other song is also heard in game, at the end of the Chains of Promathia story, which was huge and epic and definitely deserving of its own song. (Link to that, as well. AND OF COURSE. Obligatory lyrics link.)

I cannot listen to either of those without thinking of the game. (Despite having not yet finished the Chains of Promathia story, myself. Also, for reasons I am pretty sure I am never going to understand, Memoro de la Stono manages to slam right onto my IRRATIONAL EMOTIONAL REACTION button every single time I listen to it. Nostalgiaaaa. And sometimes eye-watering. I don't get it.) (Actually, the phrase "That world was [called] Vana'diel" also triggers something similar. MY BRAIN. I do not understand.)

...SINCE I'M ALREADY LINKING EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE, THIS ONE - sung by the aforementioned Susan Calloway - is the version of Distant Worlds that I much prefer. It also has a nice version of Memoro de la Stono in front of it, though they cut out the last verse, wtf.


But what was I saying. Right. Yes. So then I listen to "Answers" (the lyrics have trouble, I picked it for the pretty video. If you want the lyrics, this one has a better version of them), I think, wow, this is actually a pretty song, and I like it, but I do not see the connection. And I don't know if this is SE failing to get XIV up and running properly, or if it's just not a fitting song, or what, but it kind of makes me sad that I don't get it.



While we're here rambling pointlessly and incoherently about Final Fantasy music, though, here, have a listen to the English version of Suteki da ne and then wonder with me at why on Earth they would feel the need to do such a thing. I dunno, maybe I just have too much of an emotional attachment to the original (by "emotional attachment" I mean DAMN IT FFX STOP MAKING ME CRY EVERY TIME I BEAT YOU). ...(lyrics! - which, if you look at, you'll notice the English version isn't really that far off, but that doesn't stop me from wondering why they bothered with it.)

So, now that we’re halfway through the month of November and I don’t feel like suddenly actually committing to getting 50k words out of myself by the end of the month, I have suddenly come up with exactly what I am going to do for next year. Maybe I can come up with something slightly less hilariously lame. We shall see. I HOPE I DO NOT FORGET BECAUSE it made me giggle at the sheer idiocy of it. I have made a note to myself, but who’s to say if I’ll remember it’s there, or that I won’t lose it somehow, or… whatever.

I was maybe stupid enough to tell my manager I’m totally able to work Thanksgiving. Uuh. Self, what. At least I’ll get out at 3 instead of when it is DARK AND COLD AND DINNER IS OVER. And, according to my brother, who has worked for the same store (well, same chain, different location. Where I used to work), Thanksgiving day itself is actually pretty slow. Probably because everyone’s busy cooking.

In entirely unrelated news, the ending of Final Fantasy X still makes me do that weird thing where your eyes are leaking but you aren’t really crying? Except then the credits start rolling and I don’t have to watch anything anymore and then I kind of do cry a bit. I know I wrote a memo to myself regarding watching things that will make me cry shortly after cleaning my glasses, mostly concluding that I should not do this. I WILL NEVER LEARN.

I was going to beat it last night, but when I went to tell Aniko to STAY OUT OF THE ROOM because, you know, spoilers, it somehow came around to me starting a new file. But no such thing happened tonight and it's kind of like Ecco in that once I get the idea in my head that I need to play it, I can't get it back out until I remember exactly how it hurts me. (This is Dissidia's fault, though. How dare you use the musical cues, game?! Ecco is almost always entirely my own doing.)


Man, also, at work this evening I suddenly had an awesome idea for something to write (not the NaNo thing, that’s actually a day or two old), but by the time I had finished walking home I’d talked myself out of it. I can’t quite bring myself to say it’s a terrible idea, simply because it amuses me, and while I won’t deny at all that my sense of humor is questionable at best, it is hard to dislike something that genuinely entertains you, isn’t it?

Part of the problem might be that it was FFVIII-related, and I am ridiculously intimidated by the idea of even writing, never mind actually posting, anything about it. And I worry a lot about getting everyone wrong, because mostly I either don’t relate to them at all (personality-wise, I mean) and so wonder if I’m really doing them any justice, or because I relate to them entirely too much and then I wonder if I’m projecting. And my brain is really addled from LIFE these days and I can't remember if canon is as ambiguous as I'm coming up with or if anything is actually established. And I can't be bothered to go looking because don't wanna, though it could possibly give me a "BUT IT GOES AGAINST CANON" excuse, because of course AU fic is entirely out of the question. Of course. uurgh.