Blather, rinse, repeat

I was driving to PT today after dropping Callum off at school and I totally had something in mind to write about, but now I can't remember what it was.

PT though, PT is actually fun. I know it's a drag for some people, but it actually helps me a lot, and the people there are super nice. Most of them are like, 20-30 years younger than I am, aside from the PT himself who's a year or two older. It's a very chatty place, everyone always ends up talking and being really social. last week, I met the best friend of the woman who wrote Jennifer's Body.

There's a young woman there, Emma, she's the PT assistant. She's 27 and we get along so well. We started chatting early on last year because, on a hunch, I asked her if she played Animal Crossing New Horizons, and she about lost her mind. And so now we visit each other's islands and such.

Animal Crossing new Horizons was important to me (still is) (and to a lot of people) because it came out right at the beginning of covid lockdowns in '20, and no one could visit each other. So everyone built their version of paradise, and the game had the, like, totally prescient function of allowing people to visit each other's "homes" and interact with each other. Bring gifts, talk, "eat" together, visit the museum, shop at each other's stores, go swimming and fishing with friends. A lot of people who had to put off or cancel their weddings did ceremonies on their islands, and invited their friends, which is epic.

My one friend - actually her Mom was my friend, we were Hula sisters back in the day. But she (the Mom I was friends with) died from covid in march of '20. (And I mean, it was godawful, GODAWFUL, and it happened really fast, literally within hours her daughter was posting "Mom has covid" and then an hour later, the hospital, and then an hour later, ventilator and then by the next morning she was gone. That's how fast it was, and that's part of why I get so angry at people who still-_STILL! ALMOST THREE YEARS LATER! SIX MILLION PEOPLE DEAD!!--don't take it seriously.)

Anyway. So my friend passed, and her daughter plays ACNH, and at the time, there were no funerals going on. So she had a funeral for her on her island. I can still go to her island any time I wish, and visit her grave there. I was able to bring flowers.

I know it sounds ridiculous but ACNH was huge for a lot of people back then.

I still play it too, because they did this update where you can design homes for hundreds of different characters, and they come with certain requirements or preferences. I've always loved any kind of game where you can design and decorate things. This really hits my "dollhouse" sweet spot.

HEY I still don't remember what it was I really wanted to write about this morning!

EDIT: I treated my co-worker on Monday (massage treatment) and she was supposed to treat me tomorrow because we trade. She texted me earlier to say "I wasn't feeling great yesterday, do you mind if we bump it to next week?" and I was like OF COURSE??? Have you MET ME? Then she texted me a few minutes later to tell me she tested positive.

So I treated her Monday, she started to get sick on tuesday. Now we wait to see if I come down with it. :( I was wearing a mask (I always do,) but she wasn't. My room is 10X10 and unventilated.

I know I've been exposed in the same way before, but this one is way more transmissible, so I guess we'll see. Jesus.

Yesterday was my JOB INTERVIEW, THE SEQUEL. Also, I was waiting on a good friend's medical results, and Haku's blood tests since had been off his food for a while. So,yesterday was a little stressy for me.

After dropping Haku off at the vets, I went out around town for a bit. I wanted a costume for Distant Worlds in two weeks and I knew I could not pull Tifa off in time, so I decided on Matron from FF8, because it's damn easy:



Plus she's like everyone's Mom, so it's kind of age appropriate.

Imagine my delight when I walked into the first store on my list and found the little grey ¾ sleeve, and the long black dress? Like within two minutes? SCORE 1.

On my way back, just as I was turning the road to my neighborhood, a silver pit bull puppy literally ran in front of my front tire. I had already slowed to turn and jammed on the brakes because I saw him on the curb a second before. I ran out of my car and he came around the the driver's side, all waggy-tailed with his head bowed like, "I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing but it's not this!" So I picked him up and stuck him in my front seat, over my damn groceries. I didn't drive four feet when another car stopped at the deli next to me and waved me over. The folks in the car told me it was their friend's dog and they were looking for him. So I handed over his wiggly little puppy body and home I went, with a huge rash because I'm allergic to pit bulls. Still, he was SO CUTE.

Then, I went home and stressed about my friend's medical results. A few minutes later though, she messaged me with her very awesome news and we decided to celebrate later in the evening.

My Interview The Sequel was looming, and I still hadn't heard anything about Haku's test results or even how he had fared in today's rehab. I had to run out the door and just try to focus on what I was trained to do – which I hadn't done in about three months. I wasn't so sure it wouldn't come back to me.

The place is very peaceful, I liked it the moment I saw it. It's around where I used to work at The Bad Place, same neighborhood, same street, about a mile away. Driving down there, I realized that, even as I did not miss that crappy job, I did miss the area. It's a really beautiful drive, just endless farms, bison, horses, vineyards and farmstands. I like it out that way. I was glad to be going there again, and I felt really hopeful. I have this weird hang up about having connections to certain places, when it comes to where I work.

So, I gave a massage to the boss's sister, who wanted really strong hands with good pressure. I was known for that in clinic so I thought, 'Well, maybe I have a chance.' I also threw in some Lomi Lomi and some stretches. As I was working, I was thinking about how nice the room was, how mellow the entire place was, and that I liked it, and it'd be really nice to come here and get paid a really good salary in such a quiet location.

Soooooooo.

I GOT THE JOB. Well actually, the boss said, "We'll call you thursday," but her sister said, "You're amazing and we need what you have to offer; it's a done deal."

This TRIPLES MY SALARY.

SCORE 2.

My immediate reaction was a kind of, "Oh, cool." Then, in the car on the way home, it was just total relief. I realize I still have to (sadly) leave behind a job I have now, that I'm fond of, with a really nice company, and I'm dreading that. But, RELIEF. It's a good place, the people seem nice, it's lovely there, and the money is, well, let's just say that with tips, I should eventually be back on my feet.

It starts slow. Clients tend to not want the noob, so I'm lucky if I get ten hours the first few weeks. Then it builds up over a few months and if all works out well, I even get a raise into the deal. In a few months' time, I could probably be getting $50 or so an hour and maybe getting 24 hours a week.

This company also allows me to freelance, and do whatever I want outside of work, so long as I don't steal any clients. Which, obviously, why would I even do that? See the cool thing is that, working on my own, I was going to ask about $50 an hour for having people come to me, $60 for me going to their house. BUT, I was going to pay my own overhead, all the supplies, laundry, everything. With this, the company pays all my overhead. I don't have to clean, do laundry, NOTHING. Just what I was trained to do, and I get the money I was going to ask for anyway.

I will probably still work for myself. Tips alone will be awesome if I do that in the summer in the Hamptons. But, MAN, this seems like a sweet deal.

Anyway, as I walked into the door, I saw my messages blinking on my phone. It was a message from the vets saying that Haku's blood tests were all fine. SCORE 3! TRIPLE WORD SCORE.

Then of course, some dude I've known for years had to go and harsh my buzz on Facebook, getting on my crap because I'm trying to do my best to help Japan. Why? I HAVE NO IDEA. This isn't the kind of person who generally goes around acting like this, it was totally out of character for him. And it actually was a buzzkill, because I hate when people come out of left field acting like someone they've never been before. And he never explained, either.

And then today, I got some bad news about the health of a different friend—this one very dear to me, whom I've known for a really long time--and then some further bad news about the health / situation of yet another, newer friend.

Yesterday as I was driving home from my interview, I was listening to my iPod and the song "Three Little Birds" came on. The remake, with Ziggy Marley and Sean Paul. That was always my "yes, every little thing is gonna be all right!" happy song. I was sort of flying down the road, feeling all good and buzzy. Then I remembered that this song was my feel good song a few years ago, too. And after that, you know, everything went straight to hell.

But yes, every little thing is gonna be all right. And then, one day, it's not. And then it will again. And then for a while, it won't be.

I've always liked the song "That's Life" by Frank Sinatra – except the end; I've never liked the end. I remember David Lee Roth covered it in the 80s and he changed it to "roll myself up into a big ball, and.... FLYYYYYYY," which makes absolutely no sense and gives me a really ridiculous mental image. But I still like it better than "die," jesus.

One more thing before I go, to put this all into perspective. This is a video that Matt Conley of HitRECord released last night:



Oh, that little kanji animation at the end? I did that. :)

I, like all of us, have those "every little thing is gonna be all right" times and the "roll myself up into a big ball" times. But my entire town has not been washed away by a tsunami and then irradiated ffs. How quickly and unexpectedly all of our issues can crumble into a fault line. You know? So.

I'll take what I can get.

Last night I finished Dean Koontz's book What The Night Knows. I read it because a few weeks ago my brother called and said that the beginning sequence was really scary.

Well, yeah, the beginning sequence was scary. And then about halfway through, I started getting annoyed with his overly perfect characters, and his ridiculous, forced child-voice when he wrote young characters. The book was about this evil spirit who possesses people and wants to murder families, especially the kids. Halfway through the book, I wanted to murder the kids.

But the part that really singed my ass was when, at 77% of the way through the book (I read it on Kindle,) it turned into a MEGACHRISTIAN TRACT.

How did I go into this story so blindly, not knowing that I was going to get preached at for the last 25% section of the story? And I mean, he could not have been more obvious about his agenda. He went to great lengths to describe the beautiful, holy, soul-saving faith of the perfect female/wife/childbearer/Ultra!Sue character. He spent two paragraphs explaining why the youngest child in the family was just like Frodo, and expostulating why she was so innocent, so pure, so like baby Jesus. Like, he actually told the reader those things. After a few hundred pages of story, he just wrote like three paragraphs actually saying these things. I was flabbergasted.

However, most of the last quarter of the story wasn't only a Christian tract. It also was such a plainly* written admonishment to anyone who isn't Christian. (*I want to stop here and add that I first misspelled "Plainly" as "Palinly." Yes, that too.) Like, the story makes a point of saying that anyone who isn't sure in their Christian faith is at constant risk of being possessed and raping and then killing their entire family. Even children of those evil pagans. In fact, that's the basis of the story. At the beginning, a 14 year old boy is locked up for raping everyone, defiling their bodies, killing his little sisters etc. Koontz later explains that the reason he was able to be "taken", even at a young age, was because his mother bought crystals at a pagan store.

I KID YOU EFFING NOT.

This is the depth of his asswittery.

Towards the end of the story, the UltraChristian!Sue wife starts to think of nature itself as "a pagan beast, hunting her down."

I think I'd have more rage at this if I wasn't actually amused by how badly the whole thing is written.

Around that point in the novel, I did google "Koontz" and "Christian" to find out if he was doing it on purpose or not. Apparently he's sort of Anne Ricean in that way, where he's all like "Yeah, I'm a Christian, and if you're not, then suck my Christian wang and burn in hell."

I feel like he should reimburse me for having read his crap story. It would have been a wallbanger if it hadn't been on my Kindle.

So, that was my review of his crappy work. Now I know better.

In other news, Haku continues to make progress at therapy. He can put his foot to the floor now. Normally, most dogs can do this a few weeks after the surgery. However, seeing as he had to have the surgery twice, and then was in a cast, and whatever else, of course he had all these complications. The therapy has to be aggressive. He has to go in the water treadmill and all of this stuff.

What else is new? Not much, I guess, which is probably why my LJ has had tumbleweeds going by. Work, Kung Fu, cleaning the house, reading, writing, playing the odd video game here and there.

I've been kicking so much ass at work that they're saying they're going to make me "elite status." AFAIK, elite status does not include a raise, however. :/ Still, that would be pretty cool, I guess.

Oh, the video game is Final Fantasy XIII, still. I like it now that the battles are a little more complicated. But every time I put the game down for a few days, by the time I go back to it, I've forgotten how to do them. It's complicated at first. But I'm only in the beginning of the game, so I'm kind of still not used to it. Graphics are so fantastic, though. The story's kind of neat, too. And I like Lightning. She's a tough broad. :)

So there it is, my ranty rant on a crappy book, and some random bits of news. :)

This week has been such a stupid amount of awesome, I'm actually concerned. There was a brief writing thingie-bit-of-awesomeness, and Kung Fu awesomeness, but I'll save them for another post.

This post is just for the awesomeness that was Video Games Live.

SB, Jo-chan and I have been planning this trip since around summer time. This was like, our BIG THING that we all got to do together. In the fall, SB wrote an email to Tommy Tallarico (VGL creator) saying that he was also a composer, and that he really hoped his future would be in video game music etc. Mr. Tallarico wrote him this really nice email back, giving him tons of links to work from. Eventually SB got a really sweet, short-term internship out of it. He did some voiceover work for an MMORPG (but I forgot which one.)

SO! Saturday comes along, and we're all peeing our pants because we've decided that we're going to show up to the venue early, stake it out a little, and maybe, if we're lucky, get to meet Mr. Tallarico.

Jo-chan got there around 3, and we left by 3:40. (She was Link. I was Raine from FFVIII again.) SB left from his school and was going to meet us there. Jo-chan and I had a ridiculous amount of fun driving there, singing along to J-pop video game music and generally acting like geeks. We got there at around 5, found a prime parking spot right directly in front of the venue, and headed on in.

As we were going inside, who walks by but Mr. Tallarico. I recognized him right away and I was like, "Jo-chan. Jo-chan!" And she got all, "OMG. No way." He came over to us, complimented her on her Link costume and told her to enter the contest, then he went on his way. She immediately called SB to tell him that we'd already met the dude. SB turned into Rage Guy for a few seconds on the phone there, and then he hurried on down.

Then, Jo and I went to search out some kind of sustenance. We ended up crossing behind the truck with all the orchestra's gear in it. We joked for a minute that if this was a video game, there would be an item in the truck that we'd have to retrieve to unlock a side quest. We stood there staring into the truck, doing sound effects and music for various "YOU GOT THE ITEM" scenes. Some guy saw us lurking around and asked, "Are you with Video Games Live?" We were like, "Umm. Well we're here to see it," and other babbling suggesting that we were not, in fact, trying to get back stage or take something out of the truck; we were just looking for a restaurant or cafe or something. He told us where the cafe was, and off we went. We paid $25 for two sandwiches. O_O

SB showed up at around 6, and we went to meet him, and then went back to the cafe so he could get a sandwich too. On our way back to the venue, we went around the backstage area again. And who was hanging around out there but Mr. Tallarico himself. I had to restrain myself from shoving SB in front of him and going, "And this is my cousin, and he's a composer, and he's really awesome, and, and, and..."

So we went up to him and SB thanked him for his email, and said he'd gotten a sweet internship out of it. Mr. Tallarico actually remembered him, and they spent a few minutes talking about the internship. Then some other guy was hanging around with us, and he joined in the conversation which veered off to things like Hot Topic and how Twilight had ruined everything. Yup, we totally hung out with Tommy Tallarico for a good fifteen minutes talking about how awful Twilight is.

Then I asked if I could get a pic of him with the two kids, and we thanked him and went on our way.

Jo-chan and SB were so freaking happy, it honestly made my night more than anything else.

Some other folks started following us around too. I have no idea why. People kept coming to us and saying, "Can I hang with you? My friends aren't here yet." We got the heads-up that there was a free dinner in with our ticket to the show (hi, thanks for telling us after we spent over $30+ on sandwiches?) and by the time we got to the dinner, a group of people pulled an entire table over to where we were sitting so that they could hang with us.

I kind of started to think that maybe we literally felt like good luck, and people wanted in on that.

After dinner it was time for the concert, which was its usual geeky awesomeness. It touched me, like it did last time, with its reverence for gaming, and for gamers. This concert makes a point of how relevant video games are, and how the music that goes to games has become the kind of music that used to be odes to gods. It's not 8-bit bleeps and bloops. Characters get their own choirs. Video game music can stand alone as brilliant pieces of art. And video games themselves are as artistic, thoughtful, and relevant as movies, as theater, as great novels. They're stories – just interactive ones.

VGL has moments of irreverence and it doesn't take itself seriously either. (Little side-segments on big screens, about the Top Ten Worst Voiceovers Ever, the Top Ten Worst Titles ever etc. [A game called "Irritating Stick" and one called "Touch Dic". O_O ] ) There's a Guitar Hero playoff, like there usually is, a costume contest, audience participation, and retrospectives on gaming history. All sorts of games are included. Big, huge titles like Mario, Zelda, God of War, Halo, WoW; lesser known ones such as Afrika, and older ones like Pac Man, Space Invaders, Tetris, and yes, Tank and Pong.

And again, they did One Winged Angel. ^_^

Oh, and of course, acting as conductor this time around was Wataru Hokoyama, the composer for Resident Evil 5 and Afrika. He was adorable and amazing.

So, yes, this was just a day and evening made of awesome and win and success and geekery.

Next up?

DISTANT WORLDS, THE MUSIC OF FINAL FANTASY, WITH COMPOSER NOBUO UEMATSU. MEET AND GREET AFTERWARDS. April 1st, Brooklyn.

There's so much I can say about Uematsu and what his music means to me, and also to SB and Jo-chan. I could talk about how in '00 we all discovered Final Fantasy VIII and the song Liberi Fatali, and all the memories that go with that. How it led to an admittedly ridiculous and unrelenting Final Fantasy fandom, and all of the things that it brought to me. How, when they were little kids, 8 and 11, I'd set up the video camera in the back yard and let them have sword fights with Uematsu's music blasting in the background. They were my wee little fankidlets back then, growing up with Uematsu as their number one composer, and now they're brilliant young adults still just as smitten with the games and the music that goes to them. There is so much I could say, but it wouldn't even begin to cover it. We always swore that if we ever got the chance, we'd have to go and see a concert where they would perform our music, and if we ever got to meet Nobuo Uematsu, it would be A Very Big Deal. They actually are performing Liberi Fatali that night, so yeah. I grabbed the tickets yesterday. :)

I know this is all really geeky and I don't expect most people to understand. I can't even put it into a perspective that a non-gamer would get. I get judged a lot for being a gamer, people thinking that games are some sort of time vampire, that you get nothing at the end of a game, and that everything you win is meaningless. Just, how is that any different from reading a novel, watching a play, or a movie? You don't "win" anything after that either, except for the memories of something well-enjoyed. What, honestly, is the difference? If anyone can tell me, I'd love to know.

Anyway. Pictures and videos.

( Video Games Live! )

I can't wait to see what pics and videos I'll have after the Uematsu one. April can't come soon enough! ^_^

I've been having these crazy dreams. And obviously they are related to my playing RE2 late into the evening just before bed. I may have mentioned that the game is really well done for its time, even though for me it is a few steps backwards. It is also mega-scary. At some parts, it comes close to Regenerator scary. Okay, not quite, but sort of. Two nights ago I had a dream I was Leon and the alligator was chasing me down the hallway just like it does in the game. It's a narrow hallway and even though Leon is eight way directional he is goddamn hard to control because a) you have to use the pad instead of the analog, and b) he can walk backwards but not run,and in order to get him to actually run in the other direction you have to turn him with the control pad. The controls are something between FFVII and FFVIII. So anyway, it's a scary little part of the game and I dreamed that the alligator was chasing me/Leon down that hallway and I couldn't run quickly enough. I could feel the floor shaking behind me and the alligator snapped at my heels and then I woke up.

Last night's dream was even weirder. I might have talked about this one aspect of my dreams before; I can't remember. But I do this so often in dreams that it bears mentioning. Often I'll be dreaming of the hero of a story and he'll find himself in trouble. This is where I always step into the dream. I tell myself, "He can't handle this; I'd better do it until the crisis is over." And then I'll become the character. Usually it's men; there are very few women in my dreams and when there are, they are taking care of business themselves. In my dreams, men can't handle it and so I have to solve their crises. O_O I'm not sure precisely what this says about me but probably not something good. According to my friend Kim, however, the gender of the character doesn't matter since every character in your dream is really you: after all it's your mind and you have created the scenario and the characters, even if they resemble anyone else. So in her logic, the "hero by proxy" is just my way of solving a problem using another aspect of my own mind. Which I think is really neat.

Well, anyway. So in this dream, once again I'm playing as Leon Kennedy and there are zombies all around. A few have bitten him. (In the game when you get bitten or injured, you can no longer run; instead you hold your side and limp along, which makes every consecutive battle even harder!) So he's limping along inside this big factory, actually more like a grainery because there was definitely some grainery action going on, zombies everywhere but these were more like the Ganados of 4 rather than the zombies of 2. At the top of a silver staircase is a huge white dog. I realize that this dog is the german shepherd Jimmy, the one who I trained and finally got placed in a dog sanctuary (anyone remember how angry I was at Douche Ex Boss over that, when he kept threatening to put the dog in the pound and he made it my problem even though it was his business? And I had to care for the dog myself and finally drive it to Lindenhurst etc.? Well anyway, I was crazy over this beautiful dog and I cried when I had to say good bye to him. This was the dog in my dream.)

So there was Jimmy at the top of the stairs, and he was being used as a guard dog to protect the zombies' grainery. O_o Every few days they would throw him the arm of some person they had killed. He was chained up at the top of the stairs and he started growling at Leon. I was watching from behind a wall; I knew that he would not be able to get past Jimmy. But I also realized that Jimmy would recognize me even if I had to take Leon's place in the story. And I knew that i had to or they would both die. So I jumped into Leon (O_O) just as one of the zombies was going to feed Jimmy. Jimmy finally saw me / us and started barking. I waved my (our) arms around and said, "Jimmy, it's me! I placed you years ago, why did they put you here?" I immediately knew it was Douche Ex Boss's fault. Well, Jimmy recognized me and started barking joyfully. The zombie went to hit him, and Jimmy bit the zombie's arm. He started twisting it around until he bit the arm off totally. The zombie started to scream at him and that got the attention of all the others. They started to run towards, not Jimmy, but me / Leon. I ran up the stairs towards Jimmy where everything was suddenly so bright, and I grabbed him and hugged him really hard.

Zombies started to throw bars of soap at us. It was white soap; suddenly everything was white. Beyond the door there was a field of white flowers and we both ran into it. I kept hugging Jimmy and saying that I hoped he was okay and I missed him.

The scene changed and I was outside of what used to be my grandparents' front yard but is now my cousins' front yard. Jimmy was still with me, only he looked more Saluki-ish and I said (to no one in particular,) "This dog was the reason I got a different white dog. Otherwise everything would be different. It's like he's the grandfather, or maybe the prequel to the line of white dogs."

Then one of the zombies told me that if it hadn't been for the white dog, the entire story of Resident Evil wouldn't make sense, and that if I paid enough attention, the white dog would show how 2 became 4 and 4 became two, like a story with no ending.

And then I effing woke up.

WTF?

Let's see, let's see. Okay, I love the drill we're doing in Kung Fu, in blackbelt. It's got some steal-steps, a binh-choy, a side kick to a back-kick, then two head-removing hits, the cup choy and sou choy. (I can only hope I'm spelling those right.) I was so happy because I was doing them tonight and Sifu said I was doing a great job. Pretty much made my night!

And just because I don't want to forget this: U.S. "war on terror" eroded rights worldwide: experts

( Under the cut )

THANK YOU.

At least I hope it is a snow day, because I'm not there. O_o We got about four inches of snow and ice overnight and it hasn't quit coming yet. I would have had to leave my house at 6:30 and slid all the way there. So!

I got Resident Evil2 in the mail today, big hurray for that. I was invited by a good friend into a really cool writing group, so yay for that. I am going to visit a good friend tomorrow whom I haven't seen since last May, and so HUGE yay for that.

Here's another big YAY; an email from the town recreation department:

Also, I wanted to let you know that I received approval from civil service
for the job title of Recreation Specialist, so I will be putting in a
resolution to officially hire you at a rate of $20 per hour.

It doesn't start until May (it would have been earlier, but with the prospect of MAYBE going to China in April, we felt it better to just count on pushing the date back.) This makes me wish it was Spring already.

Oh my gosh, I have to get back into practice. I have to break out all my old notes, start to choreograph, brush up on all my terminology and history.

"Recreation specialist," heehee. Although now that I think of it, it does almost sound like a euphemism, in a way.

"Hey, whore!"

"Umm, the term is recreation specialist."

Nahh just kidding. The "recreation" in question is obviously cultural dance, (Hula,) and I am so superfly excited. :D It's about damn time that I started teaching professionally on a long-term basis. :D

Well, Christmas was everything I thought it would be! Good food, some really loud laughter, video games, and a small person running around eating too much sugar and enjoying all his toys. Celia came around with her three kids and they hung out for a while. Then they left, and, randomly, my aunt's boyfriend showed up for a while. O_O Then Chris came over with The Boychild (Tim was waiting for his Dad to show up at his house,) and then Chris and Boychild left and UD, Betsy, SB and Jo-chan showed up.

My uncle did indeed bring over his Wii and RE4 and oh man, can he ever race through this game. I played it a while too and everyone watched The Killing Of The Ganados. SB and Jo-chan told me their RE4 tagline:

RESIDENT EVIL FOUR - "I can't really see in the dark, sooooo."

That tickled me way more than it should have. Maybe you just have to know the way they phrase these things.

Later in the evening, Chris, Tim and Boychild came by again and we all had desserts.

Everyone was so happy with their gifts. I got my Mom a musical Frank Sinatra ornament statue, not really for Xmas exactly, and she really liked it. And some new headphones, and I gave her my old iPod because I got a new one. (8GB!) For my Dad I got two books: One on the life of Dinah Washington (she was his manager) and another on the greatest boxing stories (he was a professional boxer.) For SB, a DVD of Flea talking about his techniques and philosophies; for Jo-chan the RedXIII / Cait Sith figure and a Phoenix Wright book. I think the gift that went over the best was the one I got for my uncle, which was a Resident Evil calander and the best home-made t shirt I've made yet, with RE4's merchant on the front in black and silver, saying "WHAT ARE YA BUYIN'?" He thought it was really cool.

So yeah! I got a new iPod which I am thoroughly enjoying as well as a few really cool surprises, such as this kitchen tool called "the bullet" which I haven't used yet but is apparently very awesome (I like to cook, so this should be lots of fun,) a "graveyard garden" that my Dad picked out and was signed "To Morticia, from Santa," LOL, TONS of socks which I really love, the best sweater ever, a Cloud Strife keychain (WIN!) and an awesome book about Christopher Walken. O_O That's not to mention the guzheng I got last month! I also got a book on how to learn to play it. ^_^ As well as a bunch of cute little things like a datebook I needed and stuff like that.

My aunt, uncle and two cousins got me the ENTIRE Family Guy DVD set, with a big Stewie head that goes over it. So neat! And my cousins and Boychild bought me these cute Jack Sparrow thingies and also this beautiful Hawaiian watch that goes with my bracelet. They picked it out because it has a second hand and they figured I would need one in school, to take my patient's pulse. See this is something I never would have thought of on my own, and it's perfect.

Now, some KF friends and I are trying to work out when to have our party. We're waiting on The Empress and Gold Dragon to get back to us before setting a date. It had better be soon. I start college on the 6th and the clock is ticking.

Also, I am peeing in my pants.

Oh man, I just remembered a dream I had a few days ago! It's hilarious and so typically a "zOMGzzz SCHOOL!!!!111" dream. To make a very long and detailed dream short, the basics were this: I showed up at college only to find that I was totally lost and couldn't find my classrooms. Eventually I went into the bathroom and all of the toilets backed up. A pipe broke, the sinks all flooded, and I had to change my clothes before going anywhere so I started to get undressed. Then a bunch of teachers walked in and I was, yeah, naked at school. Finally I got dressed but realized I had missed my first two classes and I had no idea what I was supposed to do about that because I was still lost. I went running down the stairs and then an airplane crashed into the school. Finally I got fed up and realized that I had to talk to someone about making up my missed classes (time was spiralling out of control: days had already passed,) and I got in line to talk to someone and when I got there she asked for my registry number. I told her I had my student number but no registry number and I started to get mad. I was like, "I want to file a complaint against the way things are run here!" and she said that I needed to have a complaint number, too. Then I looked around and saw all of these hat stands and people dancing around them and I realized that not only had I missed my first few classes, but I was in entirely the wrong school. This was a hat-making / dancing school. I realized I had no idea where I was or even where I was supposed to be. And that's when my alarm went off.

But, uhh, I'm sure everything will be just fine! ^_^;;

Haha, I'm such a dork. The song and the cut-scenes just seemed to go together and I couldn't help myself. So now you know, when I say "I'm killing zombies," this is the game I'm playing. RE4 is a great survival/horror game and Leon is a fun and quirky hero. Hope you like this silly AMV!

This also served to remind me why I fell in love with 30STM in the first place. They are such a fantastic band. Jared's voice is so beautiful when he just lets it fly like that. ^_^

Oh: Please let it load before watching it, please have the sound on (hello, it's an animated music video,) and please watch till the end because it's very funny. ^_^

I don't know dude, all of a sudden I was writing fanfictions again, really short ones that I didn't even bother to finish. I was just goofing around, trying to see if I could come up with anything. I wasn't too thrilled with it.

So I did what I always do: uploaded them to a private page and ran them through my old friend The Mangler.

As always, mangled lines are in italics and parenthetical comments are my own.

( They grab onto something--a barrel a sack of grain, he can't be seeing this: spikes shoot out of his pants. )

FUN!

To get this out of the way first:

Say, Bush, you invaded the wrong country and Al Quaida wasn't there until you invaded it.

"SO WHAT?"



Once again, Cenk says it all. I don't even have to add to his commentary.

Well, now that that's off my chest... Today is otherwise lovely! It's raining, and though I wish it were snowing, this will do for now I guess. Once in a while the rain freezes into sleet and makes a cool noise on top of my patio room and the aviary.

Last night in Kung Fu we all had such a great time. We worked really hard in basics class and then in advanced we did locking and trapping and throwing. I'm feeling all stretchy today, also I think I caught a cold but it's not so bad.

As we were closing up the school I asked Sifu when our party was going to be and he said he didn't think we were having one because no one could afford it. This was a MAJOR bummer for me. I told him, "Yeah, I guess I understand. But, let's have one anyway!" and he was like, "Well, okay." In the end we decided that whoever wants to will just meet up for a night out. It probably won't be that many of us. Me, the Empress, Lady Chrysanthemum, Beautiful Boy, Snarklit, and Sifu is my guess. Maybe Scarred Hardcase and Tattooed Sweetheart.

This afternoon I'm going to see TDTESS. It plays at 4:10 around the corner here. I guess I'll go out to the grocery store and get a pint of ice cream for dinner and then head over to the theater.

BLISS, right? :)

Oops, one more thing. Making me both LOL and cringe today, Resident Evil 4 ways to die. It's 8 minutes freaking long!



It's hideous when he gets totally raped by the regenerators! And chopped in half, and run over, and stabbed repeatedly and, like, really graphically. It's kind of hilarious when Luis kills him out of exasperation. And It's AWFUL* when he drowns!














*Kind of hot.

Yeah, kind of hot.

ETA:



O_O