Before I add my own two cents here, I'd like to applaud Mark's words.  Well
said, my friend.

I write because if I don't, the ideas won't go away, and they start
to affect my everyday life because of distraction. I write anime

fanfiction

because I enjoyed reading it, and wanted to give back what I had taken.

And

I write to improve, and to experiment with styles, aspects, views, and
character design and utilisation. I've never had any writing-training or 
read any books on creative writing beyond the pitiful coverage at school.

I 

prefer to learn by doing, and reading other people's books/stories,

rather 

than spending time on a creative writing class. 

I've spent time in a creative writing class.  I'm having more fun now.

Ever since I was 10, whenever I read a book, or watched a cartoon, or
played a particularly good game (Final Fantasy, anyone?), I would always
spend anywhere from minutes to hours running through "what if" scenarios in
my mind.  Writing gave me an outlet for the whirl of ideas that always ran
through my head.
 

I write because I must.

If I stopped now, I would probably regret it.  I mean, I sleep SO much
better now.  Besides, I enjoy reading my stories as much as I enjoy writing
them, and somewhat less than I enjoy reading everyone else's fics.

(Take a bow, people).

I admit that now, here on the FFML, I've developed quite an ego.

However,

one thing has not changed: I write for fun. The fics I abandoned, I did

not

abandon for lack of attention...to this day, "Faux Existence" has outbid
everything else I write except "Onna: Red Side" for attention. I still

get

death threats <shoots Zen an evil glance> about by abandonment of FE. 

Well if you'd get off your ass and WRITE FASTER......

*grumble*bitch*complain*mutter*

(... oh, ok, and (c)IHtH is not at all a 'Sailor-flavour' story. Sailor
fanatics hated it. On the other hand, I got the vote of the republican
readers. ^_^ )

Hey, this Sailor fanatic loved it.

Actually, I was rather suprised by the response I got for my own SM fic.  I
won't lie, Shieldsman is without a doubt my favorite fiction from my own
point of view, but in many ways, it isn't very Sailor-flavor in many ways.

Speaking of which, I better get back to working on Ch 7...I HATE fight
scenes....

--
Christopher Angel
cja124@mail.usask.ca      http://www.engr.usask.ca/~cja124
"Some will say you're safer here,
 Never mind them - be a pioneer!"