"Dave Menard" <menard5078@rogers.com> wrote:

Nabby trying to give up money-grubbing is funny, but I don't see why the
wedding would be that big a deal to her. It's just not that much
different or more serious than a lot of the stuff that went on before
it. This bit can work well, IMO, if you come up with a stronger
motivation for her to be doing this.

   What would you suggest? I figured the results of the wedding debacle
might have given her pause, but... Maybe a return of Kinnosuke making her
realize how obsessive she was getting... I'll take any suggestions you might
have.

Hm. Not sure. Maybe something that affected (or threatened to affect)
her *own* well-being, as opposed to that of the others, but I dunno
offhand what that would be. Then again, maybe she's just bored with it
or something like that.

Seems a bit unnecessarily rude for him... couldn't he say something like
"I'll be there if I can manage to get away," or some other of those
answers that mean "no" in Japanese? :)

   Good idea. Howabout "I'll try to fit it into my schedule," if there's no
good re-runs on T.V., he finished silently.

Heh. Yeah, that sounds good.

"'S.T.A.R. Labs,' yadda yadda yadda... 'challenges

(Caps, and missing ')

   Missing ' I can see, but which caps? On "yadda" or "challenges"? Or
both?

No, I meant that challenges should not be capitalized here, since it
doesn't start a sentence.

"'If they should lose, Ranma Saotome shall agree to allow the scientists

of

S.T.A.R. Labs to perform the following experiments outlined hereafter,

yadda

yadda yadda... If he should defeat our champions S.T.A.R. Labs agrees to

Again, the yaddas should probably be outside the single quotes, since
they aren't directly lifted from the letter.

outlined hereafter,' yadda yadda yadda... 'If

   You meant inside the single quotes, right?

Well, technically outside, because the one after hereafter ends one
single quoted phrase, and the one before If starts a different one.

Since you've set this story after the vol. 38 wedding, shouldn't he be
off at Akari's place (or looking for it?) You might want to make a brief
mention of why he's still playing P-chan.

   I thought about it, but it seemed kinda superfluous, since it doesn't
really impact on the story.  Maybe I'll just mention that P-chan looks
uncomfortable being cuddled, or something to that effect.

What I'm getting at is that by the wedding, Ryoga had pretty much
decided to give up on Akane, and was last seen wandering off in an
attempt to find Akari. (Okay, he did crash the wedding after that, but
that was by accident.) He may, of course, have changed his mind right
after that, but I think if that's the case it at least deserves a
mention.

Bart, a.k.a. Impulse disappeared in a flash (whoops, pun!) only to

reappear

Gack. Couldn't one of the characters make this joke? Talking directly to
the readers is a good way to jolt them out of the story.

   I suppose. Personally, I don't find it that jarring in a comedic piece
(Thinking of R.J. Haynie's "Girl Days", in particular) so long as it's not
done to excess. I don't _think_ I've done it to excess, so I'll keep it.
Thanks for the heads-up, though. I _try_ not to irritate my potential
audience...

I don't wanna start an argument over "Girl Days" here... I'll just say
that a lot of narrator gags can be done using the characters instead,
and be just as funny. Of course, if you after considering this decide
you like it better the other way, that's up to you.

Sadly, the ancient Oriental art of sweatdropping isn't taught to

westerners

either, else the Young Justice team would have been doing it like crazy.

Might just be a personal stylistic preference, but I think the
references to facefaulting and sweatdropping might be better talked
about through Bart's POV, him being the one present who knows what those
things are. I can generally get into the story better through the
thoughts of a character.

   See above, more or less. It's not the sort of thing I try to do in a
serious piece, but in a silly, supposed-to-be-funny piece like this, I feel
comfortable using "To sweatdrop" and "To facefault" as verbs. If it helps, I
understand what you're saying, but I honestly can't think of another way to
phrase the joke without making it more awkward...

I was just suggesting using more of less the same joke, but through
Bart's perspective rather than the omniscient narrator's. Since he's
evidently somewhat of an otaku, it would be perfectly natural for him to
think in terms of facefaults and such. Something like:

Bart surveyed the faces of his teammates. The expressions were exactly
right, but where were the huge blobs of perspiration? Evidently the
ancient Oriental art of sweatdropping wasn't taught to westerners.

Or some such. I'm sure you can come up with something better than what I
wrote here if you work at it. Or if after giving due consideration you
think it's better the original way, then that's cool too.

head. "I

   No comma there? I'll take your word for it, but why? (Bear in mind that
English isn't my first language.

I'm surprised to hear that. You actually handle the language quite well.

Sometimes it shows that I've had little
English grammar education.)

See below. This is a point of grammar that confuses a lot of people,
even ones who are otherwise quite good at using the language (waves to
Allyn ^_^), though I've no doubt you can end up mastering it after some
work.

   UKYO: Awright, already! You want the truth? Takahashi-sensei got bored
with me after the Tako-Balls-guy story arc! Didn't you _notice_ I wasn't
around as much as before?

   RANMA: Actually, I was enjoying the peace and quiet. Not to mention a
fella can only east so much okonomiyaki before he gets sick of it...

   UKYO: BLASPHEMER! (Whips out mega-spat and sets to with great fury.)

RANMA: Don'tcha know when I'm KIDDING? Huh? Whaddaya doing with that?

UKYO: Here, Akane. Ran-chan says he's sick of my okonomiyaki, so I'll
let you cook him some.

RANMA: HEY!!

(Again, what did she point? Not the words "He's right over there." So
that line of dialog is a separate sentence from the pointing.)

   Ah, so _that's_ the deciding factor?

Yup. Generally, when you have a verb like "said" (or anything that
functions the same in the sentence) it gets the comma, otherwise not.
For example:

"Bite me, you jerk," he spat.

"Bleah. I got such a bad taste in my mouth." He spat.

Note also that if your dialog line ends in ! or ? you don't use the
comma.

"Bite me, you jerk!" he spat.

While admittedly neither of these guys is exactly a model of stability,
I don't see much reason for either of them to fly off the handle in this
situation. More likely they'd glomp their respective lady loves (or, in
Mousse's case, any conveniently-placed person or object) and pledge to
assist them in their hour of need.

   Mousse glomping a convenient lamppost, okay, that works. I can't really
see Ryoga glomping Akane under _any_ circumstances. I think I can tweak the
paragraph appropriately, though.

Sorry, I was unclear; by "these guys" I meant Mousse and Kuno.

Arrowette tapped Robin on the shoulder. "Um, Robin? Suzie and I were
talking, and it occurred to us... Does anyone here speak Japanese?"

ROBIN: Yes, I think pretty much all of the locals here do.

   I wasn't aware of any locals in the middle of the Pacific Ocean...

AQUAMAN: Hey, this is the DCverse!

That may allow him to learn all the words, assuming his memory is good
enough. There's still the little problem of getting them in the right
order. ^_^;;

   I know that, you know that, Robin probably knows that. Bart wouldn't
even think of it. Planned comic relief moment in the tale ahead hinges on
it.

Fair enough.

PRINCIPAL: Like, fah out, man.

   Wouldn't that be "fah out, mon?" Or is that too Jamaican?

Probably is, yeah. I think a Hawaiian address would be "bra" (or
"brudda" if you don't want to confuse all those haole out there. ^_^)

HAPPOSAI: Bra? Where!?


Gary Kleppe
http://www.akane.org/gary/comics.html
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