August 2025 in Review
Hello Funny People,
The Auctioneering Platform
Watari-kun's ***** Is about to Collapse
A fourth show I've been keeping up with as of late, mostly to fill that romance fix has been Watari-kun. At first, I wasn't entirely sure what kind of show this was going to be, aside from a rom-com and high school drama (like a lot of slice of life style anime). Now, several weeks and multiple episodes in, I realize it's one of those Harem Animes that's slowly building towards one of two conclusions: either the eponymous character will choose his high school crush (who as of this writing he's officially dating), or will he pick his childhood friend (who seems poised by the art to eventually come out on top). Normally, I'm not a big fan of this set up, mostly because I find it unrealistic that a bunch of attractive and intelligent young women, fictional or otherwise, would all have such poor taste in nebbishy, neurotic male characters. But I'm hooked now. I want to see if my assumption is correct.
Beautiful Dreamer by Vanessa L. Krauss
Where has the summer gone? I don't know, and frankly, so long as it's taken it's goddamn heat with it, I don't care.
Two Cents Logo by Devora Johnson
A Brief Recapitulation
As with nearly every August, this one began with a visit to Mid-Missouri for the annual Parish Picnic at St. Margaret of Antioch Church. We had a whole, mercifully cool day of bingo, fresh-off-the-grill double cheese burgers, fried chicken dinners, and the highlight of the day, the quilt auction. I never get tired of hearing an actual trained auctioneers do that cantoring thing.
As a fun new addition to this year, my Aunt Pauline, who'd taken up quilting during the pandemic, donated a whole quilt whose pattern she'd designed this year. A first for the Cassmeyer family. Two of my local cousins also helped with the stitching along with the local quilting ladies, who still largely do all their work by hand. Sadly, the quilt only went for the second highest amount of the entire auction ($1750), a detail I'm sure many people have shared with my semi-competitive aunt, so she'll be eager to donate another one so it can claim the top auction price next year. All in the name of a good cause, right?
I even got a chance to see my cousin, Alex, after almost a three year gap. He's worked for the Ford Motor Company for several years now in the KC area in the Missouri, and since he got that job (which, of course, he hates), he's since gotten himself a wife (sweet woman), a house, and two high-energy boys, the older of the two is set to start Kindergarten this year. It was good catching up with him. A lot had changed in that time, namely the death of his grandmother (my Aunt Judy). Since she passed, he hadn't much reason, or time, to visit the family in Osage Bend. After all, they had to sell-off her old house once she passed, which was a serious shift after so many years. I'm glad he made it down though; his great aunts got a lot of rejuvenation from seeing his two kids.
Life continued in its steady pace until we went to go visit my brother in Ohio for the second time this year. He'd just received notice that he'd passed his last set of board examines, which officially meant he was now (after two years of rotations and one year on the job as a resident) actually a doctor. Worst of all: he still has more tests he'll need to take in order to get his medical license after he finishes. Ain't that a sumbitch?
This go-around visiting the Buckeye State, we got the chance to take a a ride on a train that we missed out on back when we visited him in May. It carried us all the way around Akron, and the guides pointed out several major sites: the Native American statue atop the hill, marking the path were the tribes native to the area had to carry their canoes before the white folks moved it; the sewage treatment plant that saved the Ohio river from notorious pollution that literally caused it to catch on fire; Beaver Lake, which a local beaver population chose to create after damming a section of the river; the Brandywine river, which we saw the falls from last time; the old bridge that was the only structure high enough to survive a notorious flood a century ago; a swamp, where a famous Bald Eagle nest still resides (of which I sadly didn't get a picture). All in all, it was a wonderful trip.
The month ended with a visit to see my godfather at the Veteran's home in Mexico, MO. He was being honored as "Veteran of the Month." So, as many members of the family managed to make it to be part of it, including three of his five kids (my cousins, Kim, Michael, and Chris), his second oldest grandson, Brett, and my aunts Mary and Becky. We had a small ceremony, everyone talking about my Uncle Rob, and then we helped ourselves to cookies and punch, which all the residents of the home appreciated. For some reason, even though the staff are always chomping at the bit to make cookies, no one ever requests them. Strange.
My mother and I got there extra early, so we had Rob to ourselves for a good hour before everyone else showed up. Through most of that time, I basically chattered to him, mostly about all the stuff I've recounted here. His dementia has gotten to the point where, though he still recognizes me each time he sees me, he slips much faster into the fog. I can tell too; his eyes glaze over and his attention starts to wander. But, every so often though, something I'd say would trigger something in his fading memory, and I'd get a flash of my old jovial godfather again. He'd laugh. He'd smile. He'd say something simple like, "Oh, that fried chicken's good." You don't realize how much you miss those small things until they become rare as flecks of gold in a stream. Worse still: you know that, as time goes on, they're only going to become rarer.
As a special thank you, the family-friend whose brother I've been helping her look after also decided to treat me to another show at the Muny, on I'd never seen before but whose music I knew well: Jersey Boys.
(Footnote: my old band classmates in high school from the brass section used to sing "Early Angel" together from time to time. It was one of the few musical theater songs a basso-tenor voice like mine could sing easily, especially given I had no training for voice )
This might well be that rare example of a musical with a second act that's better than the first. I've seen enough shows to know that most musicals front-load their best songs into Act One, with Act Two usually consisting of a series of reprisals and one or two new decent bangers. With Jersey Boys, the first act is a bit slow, mostly because it takes a good 20-30 minutes to get through those earlier years and assemble the core cast on stage. Once they do though, the show's music and story takes off like a rocket. Though, I can't deny, this show must be a monster to cast most of the time. Finding four male singers who can match the ranges of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons must be a chore. Yet the Muny's production team did just that. Makes sense why they chose to close the 107th season with this show.
The Writing Life
First thing I did at the start of this month was resubmit my fantasy novel back to the small press for consideration. Within a week or so, they asked to see the whole thing. Sadly, I've yet to hear their final verdict as of this writing. As usual, I'm holding out hope, but I'm not holding my breath.
Speaking of holding out hope, but not holding my breath, that's also an apt way to describe how I'm coping regarding that outstanding full-request. Last year, after waiting close to nine months on a full-request, I knew the answer would be no. Now, we're heading towards five months, and I'm almost certain I'll end up with a similar result. But, at the very least, I'd like to have an answer instead of feeling as though I'm still in limbo.
In between all the waiting, though, I've returned to something to which I, as usual, didn't think I would return: short fiction.
After finishing the revisions on my story from last year's Repeat Offenders Workshop, I decided now was the right time finally to complete another story I'd been putting off. Two years ago, I submitted a piece to Interzone called "Requiem for the Shoeshine Man," which the editor, one Gareth Jelly, had liked, but he hadn't been fond of the ending. For three years, I couldn't figure out how to fix the ending...until now. I realize I'd made a fundamental mistake with my MC, which I duly revised. Over the course of a week, I redrafted the entire story from page one with that major revision front-of-mind. The result: a far stronger, but quite different story. It's not ready for submitting, of course, but I do intend to begin rewrites on it soon, once I've allowed it to "cool off."
After that, I started to hanker to do more short fiction again. Since then, I've made ten submissions to various periodicals for short stories I still had in my files, and I've set reminders to send out several more come October. I've also drafted "outlines" for another new short story as well, though when I'll get to it, I'm not sure. But it will happen at some point.
Miscellaneous
I found myself battling some low-grade depression again for the first time in a while. It started hitting me out of nowhere while I was still visiting my brother. The weight of the world and the weight of this year are truly at last catching up with me. I wake up angry most days, just because of how truly fucked up and unfair life is and has proven itself to be. If I'm lucky, I get seven hours of sleep, which seems to be all my body needs. But most days this month, I hadn't been getting that. I'm trying to get consistent again though, if only for my sanity.
Also, as a footnote, this year, in Friday August 22nd, marked Ray Bradbury's 105th Birthday. Live Forever!
I plan on rereading several of his autumnal classics this year to celebrate his life and work.
Speaking of reading, despite the depression, I've been keeping up with my book-a-week challenge pretty well, in addition to watching some new stuff.
Marc Maron: Panicked
While I'm sad to see Maron end his podcast, I am glad to see him come back again for stand up. Much like how his 2017 Netflix special, Too Real, seemed to capture how everyone was thinking during the first run of orange buffoon, Panicked captures the general ambiance of how most leftie progressives are thinking now. Hopefully, he'll keep us all going with another special very soon.
The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie
Why Warner Bros. didn't believe in this film enough to support it, I can't understand. Did they honestly believe the Looney Toons couldn't work on film without either Bugs Bunny as the lead or a real-life human celebrity reacting off of them? Ridiculous. You have the two OG Looney Tunes, Porky and Daffy, taking center stage for the first time since Bugs Bunny's rise to prominence in the 1940s in a completely hand drawn animated film that combines classic slapstick and sight gags with a plot straight out a 1940s scifi B-Movie. And guess what? It works. It's funny; it's sweet; it has lots of action and cartoon zaniness; and most importantly, it's not trying to be anything except what it is and knows it is: a Looney Tunes movies. I wish I'd gotten out to see it in theaters earlier this year
Dandadan, My Dress-Up Darling, & Gachiakuta
My weekends have basically become anime centric. In Saturdays, I watch My Dress-Up Darling's latest episode and the newest episode of DanDanDan, and now, with both shows' current seasons set to end soon, I can say both have delivered far and above.
I don't know if Dress-Up Darling will get a third season or if this current season will be it's last, but either way, it's been pure joy watching the characters and the animators spread their wings. However, I am confident that DanDaDan will get another season after this. The next arc of the manga alone will probably be enough to fill 12 episodes, and although it won't be the last in the current saga of the series, it will be one heck of a fun time should a third season head into production. Fingers crossed 🤞
As for Gachiakuta, this show only gets more interesting with each new episode. Rudo continues to adjust to his life in "The Pit," alongside the other Cleaners. Yet, now, we've had a new development. Something we've all suspected since the second episode has, at last, been confirmed through the observations of other characters: Rudo isn't an ordinary Giver. His vital instrument, his old battered gloves Regto gave him prior to the story's beginnings, is one among a unique set, granting him the power to make any object a vital instrument, if only temporarily. How this will affect him or his life, we've yet to see, but undoubtedly, it will make things more complicated for him and more interesting for us, the audience.
The Haunting of Tram Cart 015 & A Dead Djinn in Cairo by P. Djèlí Clark
Clark's work has been on my radar for years, but I'd never gotten around to reading any of it simply because there are so many books and I don't have endless time. But finally I squeezed in two of the four Dead Djinn universe stories in one week, which honestly dovetail really nicely into each other. Both take place in a steampunk version of post colonial Cairo, Egypt, where Djinn have enabled the country and the city to achieve modernity through their strange magic-based technology.
In both pieces, we follow agents from a new government organization called the Ministry of Alchemy. Their job: to investigate any and all strange happenings involving enchantments and magical mayhem. In the story, "A Dead Djinn in Cairo," we follow in investigator as she looks into the apparent murder of a Djinn. In the novelette The Haunting of Tram Car 015, we follow a classic jaded old cop/new young cop odd-couple as they look into a public transport vehicle over which some strange foreign spirit has somehow taken possession.
I play to pick up more of Clark's work in future, both his novel in the Dead Djinn Universe and his books that take place outside of it.
Krauss's latest scifi thriller focuses on a young woman named Ruta. Left comatose after a car-wreck, Ruta's consciousness finds itself transported into a realm called The Sleepverse. This dream space acts as a crossroads between every realm of the multiverse, where myriads of versions of herself congregate and confer with one another. Once Ruta gains an understanding of this realm and her own place within it, she finds herself asking two questions: why, after so much time, has she finally entered the Sleepverse, and will she ever be able to leave?
Vanessa, who's been a social media colleague for years now, recorded the audio herself, and while she did a good job making a serviceable audiobook, I did take a moment to share some feedback with her. I listen to many audiobooks. Hell, that's how I do most of my reading these days. So, I've gained something of an attuned ear for quality while the book was serviceable (i.e. an unabridged recording of the whole story), I advised her to keep a few things in mind for her next outing. Chief among them: slow down and change things up a bit. Uniformed rushed narration does not make for a pleasent listening experience. I hope she keeps that in mind when she brings her Fatality series into audio next year.
When The Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi
Scalzi's newest standalone asked the age old question: if the moon were to sudden turn to cheese, how would people respond? The answer he arrives at: exactly how you'd think they'd react--variously.
I must admit as well that this is the first 3rd person Scalzi novel I have unreservedly enjoyed. I said it perviously that I found his style--clear, chatty, funny, contemporary, and heavy on the dialogue--to lend itself better to first person narrators. While I still think that, this go-around, I didn't find that to be the case. Perhaps because the story takes place in a facsimile of contemporary earth, it seemed to work better. Also, because the book reads like a story cycle rather than an outright novel with a single character weaving the narrative together, perhaps that helped as well. Howeve
Personally, the most moving chapter for me (as something like a writer), was chapter 23, which recounts the story of a young, would-be fantasy novelist who, as the pending cheese-apocalypse nears, feels as though she "waited too long," to tell her story. Given I finished the first draft of my first novel during the heart of the pandemic, I could relate. And I still do.
Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao
Zhao, of course, has been on my radar for a long time, largely because they're a great online presence. Like all book people who kept abreast of controversys online, I saw the video of their takedown of the live-action Mulan from a cultural standpoint. I was also online through the majority of the controversy regarding their wrongful elimination from the Astounding Award for Best New Writer ballot in 2022 during the first WorldCon in my memory that took place in China. I was online when they helped expose the highly controversial one-person review bombing scandal carried out by an insecure (and likely in poor mental health), white debut YA author. And of course, I applauded when they won the Astounding Award for Best New Writer at last year's Glasgow WorldCon. So, that left one question unanswered: would their debut live up to the hype.
And it did.
Combining the life of real Chinese historical figure, Empress Wu, and elements of Mecha anime like My Darling in the Franxxx, Zhao achieves something in this novel that can only be called original. A story of female rage against a unjust system; a story of questioning social norms that are blatantly unfair; and a story of determination to change things for the better, moving a society towards something genuinely more equal.
(Also, from a craft standpoint, it was really enjoyable reading a novel that so perfection encapsulated Kishōtenketsu, which I supposed is par for the course, given it's inspiration.)
Though, I must admit, it's hard for me to understand why this book is YA. If anything, considering some of the thematic material, this book ought to be, at the very least, New Adult (if that's even a thing). Zhao themself even said they regretted marketing this book as YA, but I supposed that's expected in the current world of publishing, especially if you're a BIPOC or non-male author.
Naturally, I plan to continue the series at some point.
Summer days have faded, funny people, Now, we're entering the darkening seasons. I don't know what else to tell you except that, for Christ's sake, stay safe, stay healthy, and please remember to enjoy yourselves.
— IMC 🙃
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