Appa's Thoughts

I really like randomly finding people doing musical performances. Especially when they're giving out cookies. It's even better when they're really good at their performance and they sound unique, then they don't even need cookies to get me over to listen.

Today I stumbled on one of my classmates singing at the piano while another guy was playing bass. Too bad I came at the tail end of their performance. I know this guy--a sophomore--is an actor, and I've seen him in two studio plays which I liked, and from our seminar discussions I can see he's pretty bright. But then seeing him perform with that much energy and personality at the piano?

I'm a fan.

There are a couple of girls I'm a fan of here, too. One is a junior and her sister is a freshman, and I first saw them singing some soft and airy harmonies at an event last February. I would notice them from a far and admire how well they harmonized (and I could tell right away that they were in sync enough to be sisters), but it was at the honor's college coffee hour last spring when I spontaneously made a rant/song about having been a transfer student, the older one came running to me afterward to tell me how happy she was to meet someone else who transferred in there. We shared an instant understanding that none of the people who had been through the freshman program could have understood, and since then she's one of my most pleasant acquaintances.

These two sisters are so bubbly off stage. They're always smiling, laughing a little awkwardly, and when they're together they get each other laughing more. They always have someone nice to say whenever I run into either one of them. And they get away with saying things like "It was so whimsical when John took off his hat!"

At a different coffee hour recently, they both dressed up as Elvis, and laughed in their flighty way and could barely make out "thankyouverymuch" without laughing, but when they sang their renditions of Elvis songs, or more recent popular music, it always sounded heavenly.

I'm a big fan of them, too.

-----

And then there are the two girls I've been watching Fushigi Yuugi with...

I'm been very amused about some of their reactions to thinks. They want to see Miaka and Tamahome wind up together, but we all liked HotohorixMiaka. Actually, I had never liked or disliked Hotohori and Miaka as a pairing, but this time around I suddenly preferred it.

Anyway, they both started as Hotohori fans, and then they liked Tasuki when he came in, and then one took to liking Hotohori best while the other liked Tasuki especially. I let them know Chiriko was my favorite but I like them all and just feel sad that Chiriko got jipped in the anime. And I've been pointing out silly inconsistencies or saying things like "yes!! They got the animation budget back in this episode!" and "Watch the blood. Watch the blood. Why is it pink? Why does it look like petals!?"

***SPOILERS FROM HERE ON OUT***
( It's the part of the series when they're dropping like flies. )

Oh wow. It's 1:30am. I have a field trip tomorrow I should get some sleep prior to. I spent so many hours today working on two take-home economics exams that time passed me by completely. But they're done, yay! ☆☆☆

Some Broadway songs drive me crazy with how catchy they are. I tend to prefer Sondheim's tunes such as those in Into The Woods or Pacific Overtures, but lately I've been stuck on a few Avenue Q songs, which I can really blame AMVs for. Every so often I'll find myself singing or humming "It sucks to be me... It sucks to be me..."

Darn it! They're just so catchy!

----

Anyway. I have no talent with LJ design.

Actually, the current layout I have was something I made someone else do, and I don't even like it much. I had been hosting a picture for it on Geocities, and even though I knew Geocities was going to disappear, I didn't do anything. I wouldn't know how to do anything anyway.

But I still like using my own pictures on my journal, so---would anyone with a little more know-how mind helping me out with making my journal a bit more cohesive and showing me where I can change things so that it can grab an image hosted elsewhere? Depending on how much effort it takes (like I said, I have no idea), there might be a fanart reward in it for whoever helps me out (feel free to mention this to friends who might be interested).

.....Please?

So much for getting any editing on my thesis done this week. -__-;; I've made three minor changes. I must hurry up, especially if I want to color that mermaid pic this weekend. It occured to me a couple days after drawing the lineart that it would have had the right busy-ness and feel if I had added FISH. Hindsight now... she just happens to be a mermaid in a sea with coral and sponges and seaweed... but no fish.

Songs I'm enjoying lately:
"White Lies" - Princess Ai
A whole bunch of Rainie Yang
"Tori ni Naru Toki" - Satsuki
"Ash Link Snow" - The Beautiful Green
"Swing of Life" - YUI

I've been trying to listen to my music with my sister. She and my brother seem to get very bored with my tastes... well, meh. I like melodies I can distinguish from a beat. (Or rather, I like songs which are fun to sing to.)

Ahaha... this computer can't read the Chinese on my music files. -.-; I should sleep. I should sleep so that tomorrow evening I might be able to work on this paper which should not be taking this long to edit.

The Stolen Meme: Write down 20 things that your f-list (probably) doesn't know about you.

1. I feel odd wearing skirts, but I love doing pretty things with my hair and keeping long nails.

2. If no one is watching, I dance while sitting at my computer. Not that anyone would want to see my poor dancing skills even while standing up.

3. A friend got mad about me two months ago and called me an anime elitist. I'm not as much of one as I used to think I was, but she made me feel so bad that I still feel guilty for maybe having sounded mean towards anyone.

4. I can sing along to songs I have not heard since I was 13 or 14.

5. I still daydream almost every day of going to Japan to write manga under a Japanese pen name. I debate between whether it should be "Takada Ruri" or "Taka Ruri".

6. My first Japanese pen pal was an artist who I looked up to on Oekaki Central. We have lost contact, but it's thanks to her that I got interested in Please Save My Earth.

7. I've talked with a driving instructor about Please Save My Earth, which surprised us both.

8. I can identify a lot of flowers in both English and Japanese because of Please Save My Earth.

9. I used to auction my art off for Pocky.

10. I love dark chocolate with pretzels, orange flavoring, mint flavoring, lime flavoring, green tea flavoring, white chocolate bark, strawberries, certain cereals, fancy cookies, other candies, almonds...

11. My older sister still calls me "Tohru" years after it's lost its Fruits Basket ties for us.

12. I've had an EEG scan, an MRI scan, an EKG, blood tests, and biofeedback therapy to try to help me with my migraines. I quit with the treatment four years ago when a neurologist tried to give Botox injections. Crazy man.

13. I used to get teased for my poor sense of direction. That made me so embarrassed that I decided to have a better sense of direction. It worked.

14. My mom didn't let me watch Sailor Moon when I was kid.

15. I have better vision than 20/20, but on a recent test I took, I had surprisingly poor depth perception.

16. When I was a baby, I learned to walk by clinging to the family dog. She was a patient dog.

17. I love sitting in trees!

18. I currently work as a telemarketer. Well, that's only half true. A true telemarketer would try to sell you something and then get your money. I only do half of that.

19. I used to work as a secretary. I hated that job and only found out several months later that a coworker actually had been sabotaging some of the things that went wrong.

20. I can swim, but I dislike swimming because I dislike being wet.

*procrastinating on a couple theses, even though the samurai one is almost done~~~*
*is going to make a night of rewatching Arjuna for the first time in five years instead~~~*
*is very happy about that~~~!!*

A couple thoughts about music from or about Japan:

I liked the Baiser music I had. It was alright. Then I happened see to a music video of theirs and saw that they were an image band. Suddenly I like their music that much more. XD Funny how that works.

I'm doing some Japanese culture related research this semester for my honor's thesis, and besides having to read books which make the American anime fandom into a study (a little weird to read when you're a part of it), I've been listening to some American songs about Japan which were written about 100 years ago. Yeah, wow, some of these references to Geisha are totally off, as usual, but I am surprisingly attracted to these songs. ^^;; Although the 'yup yup' in the Tango Tokio one is sitting well with me. (Ah, but no, my research isn't really much about anime fandom. It'll be more about samurai, I think. *loves samurai*)

Despite talking about these song, I'm currently singing along to the Pretear opening. I've loved White Destiny for years.

A note about fanfiction:

By golly, I almost forgot I had fanfiction to upload this semester!

Here is the first chapter of the Keisuke and Tetsuya centric fic: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4798569/1/

And now I'm singing along to the Sister Princess opening... I still know this?? Gosh, and I can stand to listen to Yui Horie? Ai-yai-yai-yai-yai-yai-yai!! Ahhh! The last time I sang to this I didn't even know much Japanese!

Somebody be proud of me. I'm not bringing my manga with me to my dorm this semester.

Or at least, not much of it. I'm only bringing a couple I got in Japan, and my two Haruka fanbooks to make up for not bring the Haruka manga with me. And... I'll just have to be sad without Please Save My Earth.

Still, I think I belong in Cephiro. As I was packing, I found myself thinking "if I have enough willpower, this box will fit in the suitcase alongside my stack of books!". At the expense of a little injury, my willpower won. Still, I am not all that happy about having to go back so soon and pay for my bags to get them through the airport with me. Grr. Why am I not still in Japan!? Why didn't I just go to a local college?!?

Oh. Because I have an ego and wanted to try out something in a different part of the country. Riiiight. At least the trip back from Japan was so fraught with problems that the airline gave me three different coupons for future travel. I don't think they realized that they gave me three different ones. Oh well, sssshhh. They will be used on three different flights later this year.

In the meantime... aaarrrrrrrgaaghhhhhh!!! I don't feel like going back yet! Packing is making me sick today. At least I had some Hysteric Blue to listen to. Sometimes I forget how much I love that nearly-nonexistant-thanks-to-Sony band.

More about that Osaka trip to look for anime goods and finding lots of stuff I didn't want instead.

*sigh* I'm a closet Rozen Maiden fan.

While my friend and I got stuck in one floor of a store looking for the escalator back down, we stopped for a moment to look at a few t-shirts (which were on a doll/model-making supply floor). And I found myself quietly singing along to "Kinjirareta Asobi" (the first Rozen Maiden opening).

For having not seen more than a few minutes of the anime, I know a surprising amount of that song. But as soon as I caught myself I was like "ahh! Some of the guys here are going to stare!", so I stopped singing.

Then later on at a cosplay goods store, I found and recognized Suiseiseki and Shinku's outfits immediately, but was annoyed, thinking "don't use this fabric if you're going to make (and sell) Rozen Maiden costumes! They don't use colors this bright and gaudy! They use darker tones that should be a little shinier. Don't use the absolute highlight as the base color, this fabric doesn't even have good shadow contrast! Please, use slightly better fabric next time!"

*sigh*

So I'm highly critical of anime like Haruka, even though I am not an animator or animation director, and I'm highly critical of cosplay, even though I can't make it worth anything. I'm an idealist in that arena.

Yet I find myself far less critical of fanart and doujinishi because I do know how fun and/or difficult it is. I did stumble on some doujinishi while I was out (and even though I don't like yaoi, I felt far more at home with those pictures posted all over the staircases instead of the pictures aimed at the other fans). I found some Digimon doujinishi with adorable art on the covers, and while I love how Digimon characters work so well in any kind of art, I couldn't bring myself to consider buying any of it because of what would probably be inside. *sigh* They were all arranged by pairing... doesn't anybody write platonic doujinishi!?

Yesterday was rough. As has been a lot of this semester, despite being able to do a lot of fun things. I'm going to miss karaoke so much once I get back to the US. Anyway, last night we had practice for the karaoke contest for the cultural festival. It's just for a handful of foreign students to sing in Japanese, and I'm singing a YUI song. I love YUI, a lot. I get pretty nervous singing in front of large groups, but when I heard my voice on the loud speaker I was very impressed that it was actually me.

Standing alone on a big stage late at night and singing my lungs out... I loved it! It was such a rush, the sound of my voice filling the place.

I hope I won't be so nervous at the performance so I can hit some of the high notes better, but I'm not expecting to win anything. Not that anyone there is very competetive with each other either, which is cool. I went to karaoke with some of them this weekend, and got to rock out with one of them to "Butter-fly" (the Digimon Adventure opening) and "Rinbu Revolution" (the Utena opening). I really, really liked her song she's doing for the contest, "Melissa"... I've got to find some music from that band.

I am very, very fond of YUI's lyrics. I'm really nervous about ruining this song by singing it so much, but thankfully the version that really got to me before was the acoustic version, so I'll probably be okay not getting jaded to that one too fast. Surprisingly, some of her more famous songs are not ones I'm as fond of. XD Ah, anyway. I'm a total YUI fan, and this being my random acts of fandom journal, I don't feel bad saying it over and over.

My throat has a very, very sharp pain which started last night while I was studying, kept me up all night, and persists now to make me miserable. It also has brought along it's friends, body-stiffness and runny nose. I blame a certain person who does not realize that it is rude to cough on other people's dinner.

Sadly, Thursday morning I have a late morning class, so I have a few minutes to practice my song for a big karaoke contest. Yeah, when I tried singing today it looked more like the first episode of Full Moon wo Sagashite with the poor little girl getting ready for the day and singing her little song and then BAM!! Her throat starts trying to kill her! I was half-expecting an old lady to walk in and scold me for singing.

But I'm not seeing Shinigami yet. I'm okay.

What makes this really sad? I've got full plans starting tomorrow, including two karaoke trips. *sob* Why can't people realize how impolite it is to cough in other people's food!?! I'm supposed to meet my sempai and sing dramatic Utena music with her!! Well, thankfully, she's also a fan of Full Moon, so she can appreciate the meaning if I try singing a Changin' My Life song and then get into a coughing fit or something. But there are people expecting me to sing lots of YUI music tomorrow... ;___; Oh! And one of them in a Fushigi Yuugi fan, too. They probably won't have any character themes in the database, but oh, if they do---!

I should be typing stuff up in Japanese right now. But meh... it's useless with only this much time until class and my bones feeling this stiff.

*shakes fist* Stupid 5-year-old, not watching where he coughs and loving to get in my face!!!

I think wherever I go, I am doomed to learn the songs to little kids shows. And I mean way little. This morning on my way to the train station I found myself singing/humming "donna iro ga suki?" (What color do you like?).

I finally saw Sazae-san. If Maruko-chan is the Peanuts of Japan, then Sazae-san is probably more like the Flintstones or Jetsons or some other boomerang cartoon. I think I'll take Maruko-chan instead, since the "Pichana pichana" song is so much fun.

Still loving karaoke here. I sang the Rose of Versailles opening last weekend because BeruBara was on the brain, and in a little box with a microphone, I sound great. OSCAAAAAR!!!

---

It is terribly obvious, if someone observes closely enough, that I am a Haruka fan. If the Shimon and Sefuru zipper pulls on my backpack don't give it away, then my Shirin and Takamichi illustration on my notebook will.

---

I have a theory that if it weren't for Walt Disney and Shintoism, anime would not have become this popular. Seriously, would any other country have thought of something like Pokemon? I have a guess that somewhere along the long history and the fuzzy distinction between Shinto traits and Japanese culture where all these little harmless and powerful, formless and strangely familiar, seen and unseen creatures were born...wait, this is a long sentence, I forgot where I was going. Anyway, I think it's because of those that the little monster genre became so succesful. I also think it's mainly thanks to Walt Disney that there is such a strong animation genre throughout the world, because even Osamu Tezuka was highly inspired by Disney, and Tezuka paved the way for and inspired so many other creators, that it probably wouldn't have picked up much speed otherwise.

I have said before, though, that I don't really like modern day Disney (but, as a disclaimer, there are still recent movies I liked a lot, mostly Pixar), and though I liked a lot of them as a little kid, I just don't enjoy most of the older Disney movies now (though I can appreciate them). Mickey Mouse just doesn't do it for me. Still, as much as the Disney Princess stuff turns me off (now, anyway, I did like them as a little kid), Disney stuff is EV-ERY-WHERE in Japan. x__x;;

Okay. Forgot to mention I tried out some real karaoke for the first time last Friday with a friend. I didn't sing all anime songs, but just a couple. There's a setting for seeing how well your singing ranked against everyone else in Japan who that particular song that day, and as far as anime songs are concerned, I ranked in the top half for those who sang the caffeine-hyped "Ultra Relax" from Kodocha, and I ranked #1 for everyone who sang Bleach's 1st ending, Rie Fu's "Life is Like a Boat". That's probably because of my amazing English skills. Also sang a Full Moon song! Yaaaay!

Today one of the required sessions for my college was about STDs and health issues. I don't feel I need it because besides already knowing, I have no plans to dabble in any of that outside of marriage. Still, the teacher presenting it kept it a bit interesting by keeping it focused on the situation in Japan and showing a few public service announcements which have been effective.

Anyway, I bring this up because there was a part when he was explaining sexual networks and said "and this is what I'd like to call the 'Black Rose of Versailles' example." I loved really loud, but... uh... I hope I wasn't the only one who saw the humor in it, much less understood it. In any case, I wound up explaining the joke to someone later, and then recalling some favorite BeruBara scenes and... oohhhhhhhhh. ;___; OSCAAAAAAAAAAAAR!!

Reply to this post and I'll assign you a letter. List 5 songs you like that start with that letter, and post them to your journal with these instructions.

1. "Butterfly" - Smile .dk

2. "Blue Wind" - YUI

3. "Bathwater" - No Doubt

4. "Breathe Today" - Flyleaf

5. "Butter-fly" - Koji Wada

I love Digimon.

---

I was doing some chores while listening to my MP3 player and nothing quite makes me break out into song like "Prism". Of course, something deep inside my while I was lip-sync-ing was screaming all fangirlish like, "KI-YO-TA!! <3" Oh, Aquarian Age dub...

I still love Midorikawa's "Voice".

Oh my gosh, I wish I was daring enough to sing Full Moon songs for the idol contest at the Japanese univeristy (only open to foreign students singing in Japanese). I'm pretty sure I'm going to sing a YUI song because it's not quite as dorky and I have karaoke, but... Eternal Snow somehow still feels like it's my song, even though I can't relate to the lyrics much. It was just such a touching episode of Full Moon... *sob!*. Plus, I have the opening karaoke, and Scanty can be a blast to sing to, and dance to! Plus, the long Japanese words are fun.

I still have time to decide I want to do an anime song because I know them better, but I don't know that I want to sing it in front of a school full of people at a cultural festival. YUI is popular right now, YUI would be much safer, but I hope I'm able to sing YUI-style songs well.

I need to go to another anime con to sing a bunch of anime karaoke where I'll actually feel like less of a dork than many of the other people.

My dad asked me to help 'anime-ize' his coworker's 13-year-old daughter's room by giving them ideas for 'typical anime backgrounds.'

Instead, I wound up making my biggest pieces of work ever on the MAUVE colored walls, including a face so big that a single eye was bigger than the paper I usually use. It was a giant shoujo face I had to stand on a tall ladder to complete (and there was a full body fairy on the other side of the room, plus placement of many shoujo-bubbles).

Oh, and the girl has no idea what is going on, she hasn't moved into the house yet. I hope she likes it.

So... now my arms and hands hurt. And I need to go to work tomorrow. T____T;;;; Still, I'm pleased how my giant art piece turned out.

Tomorrow, I hope to have time (that'd be unusual!) to practice the calligraphy piece I want to do to thank the old man I'll be staying with for a couple days in Japan. I stayed with him last year (he's my cousin's other grandfather, so I got to call him 'Ojiisan'), and I gave him some calligraphy I did while I was at the high school, and he also was a very big fan of Noh theater. I have since studied Noh, so I want to do a piece with the famous final lines of 'Atsumori'. In English, they're "please pray for my soul, please pray for my soul", and while I found the Japanese script to copy the characters and look them up, I have no idea which way they're being pronounced. x_x;; I'm not familiar with them at all, and the grammar is also unfamiliar because it's from a few hundred years ago (the grammar I was studying last semester was more Heian and Kamakura era, much older).

Aaaahaahhhhh, I don't want to go to woooooork. But maybe I'll read some Gakuen Alice during my lunch break, since I haven't listened to 'Hyakumonogatari' yet to start reading it. 0r no, I know I should be doing Chinese. T_T

On another note, I was looking for Hysteric Blue karaoke, and instead found a bunch of YUI music. I love YUI. *_*

And on another note, flattering reviews are... like kittens. I don't know, my mind isn't working creatively anymore today. But I've been seeing them in my inbox on a bunch of my fics lately and I'm quite happy that people are enjoying my work.

Renaissance festival was fun. I went with a group of five girls, all dressed up, one of whom and I were sure we knew each other but finially figured out that we went to the same two elementary schools, were in the same grade, had the same kindergarten teacher, knew the same people, went to the same teacher's piano recitals, yet we were never in the same class. Totally uncanny, all that.
I didn't buy anything at the festival (sans lunch), but I did ride on an elephant and ride on a camel. Yayness. I also had a picture with Prince Dashing (Charming was on the roof).

And now I am red as a tomato. Thanks to the sun, not Prince Dashing! I so do not want to go to work tomorrow.

Oh, and on the way back and at the near-empty pizza place, there was much random outburst into anime opening songs and a few characters image songs, some of which were by request (including 'Akai Itsutae' *beams*). They started calling me an iPod for having so many songs memorized. Not that I was the only one singing, and the other's started it! But three of us at a time singing the Bokurano opening or the Shounen Onmyouji opening was great. Ah, and on the way up I caught my childhood aquaintence singing a Chinese song I knew, despite her not knowing Chinese. Oh, and my friend I are total dorks for conversing in Japanese at a renaissance festival. Apparently, we can't give it a rest when we're together.

When I got home, I watched episode 3 of Soul Eater, the only one I had. It's very shounen, but the main girl looks pretty cool when she fights (from what I could tell in the opening and ending), and I like that the people are weapons, and hell yes, Death the Kid's OCDness was quite entertaining to me. Still, I don't think I could stand to watch much more. Plus, I was scolded today for not having watched Code Geass... however it's spelled. That one. And I was also scolded for barely being into Gundam Seed. *sigh* I have an anime debt.

Ow ow ow ow. Sunbuuuuurn.

I love "11:00AM" by HY, because that song played everywhere while I was in Japan. But my sister accidentally got the Engrish version... aaahhhh!!!! >___< Hurry up, YouTube, I need to hear the Japanese version again to get this out of my head!!

I am so so so eager for the next DVD of Princess Tutu. I have 4 episodes left, and am going out of my mind wanting more. There will be a ranty post full of spoilers later this week or next weekend once I finish it. Might I just say in the meantime that this series was at least a hundred times better, more intense, thoughtful, creative and griping than I expected it to be while watching the first few episodes. I want to see more, but I also don't want it to end! (Now I'm turning into Drosselmeyer.)

Also loving Miyu, 14 episodes into it. It's disturbing just how similar she is to my character, as I mentioned before.

Ahhh.... good, Japanese 11:00AM: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLJ_G0rnL7M

Still in a partial art slump. I drew Hikaru (from MKR) on an index card yesterday, and the sketch looked nice, but then I tried too hard to CLAMPify it. I should have done a reverse anatomy check before inking it, because uuuugggh, her face is all too one side and her mouth looks retarded because I drew it too high and then tried to fix it by having it be open. When will I learn that less is more!?!

And now the area above my desk makes it look like I am a way bigger fan of CLAMP than I actually am. I have the giant Hinoto pic and now two Hikaru's. I also have a large watercolor pencil Arjuna pic (everything else is done in prismacolor markers), a large Juuni Kokki group pic, and a small Rozen Maiden pic. There's also the shiki from my class in Japan last summer and a shiki with my calligraphy (which I'm starting to dislike, except that it balances out the rest of the board), a dried up cyclamen (it's hard to tell it was even a flower now), and a few wordy things. It's starting to bug me... this weekend, I foresee a giant reorganization of my board. And I'm really starting to like drawing on notecards, even if they do take about two hours each. I like small mediums. ;___; The Japanese studies board is soooo big that Wakaba-hime killed my favorite skin-colored marker. Ah, and sensei insists that I should sell my art. Ahhh, I think I'm too selfish and I don't paint.

In other news...
I found out yesterday that one of the girls I've been hanging out with is also an FY fan. *glitter* I didn't even know she was a manga fan until last night. My other two FY fans and I are FINALLY getting together this weekend to watch and OVA after deciding to do that last October.

Chinese music. My school is having a big celebration soon to commemorate our becoming a Confucian institute, and all the Chinese classes have to learn to sing "同一首歌". Yay, it's pretty. :D We'll see how this goes.

The Japanese teacher said yesterday that I looked like the main character from the School Rumble manga. ....bwa? First, he doesn't follow manga much, only when students want to translate it for independent study. Second, I looked it up later, and I at least don't think I look like the main character in the anime, but I have no idea if they're different. Speaking of independent study, at some point later this semester, I will post my translation of an old folk tale.

1.
I need Chinese music!! So I can listen to Chinese more!!
I need French music!! So... I can enjoy French because it sounds pretty!

Seriously, the vast majority of my collection is Japanese and I'd love to branch out of that a bit. Some more Bulgarian or Bollywood would be cool, too. Any suggestions to look out for?
I need to figure out how to get my computer to type in Chinese in addition to Japanese and English, but my language bar and I argue anyway. >_<

2.
OMGOSH!! I think I might be coming out of the slump a bit. I made two sketches today for nice pictures: a big Utena group pic which still needs lots of detail (pronounced "rose petals") added to the sketch, and a smaller Rozen Maiden pic of Suiseiseki and Souseiseki. Hmm... not my usual subject matter. Maybe something deep inside my muse is pleading for sparkle and frills.

Thing is, I've been finding myself later and later running to class because I've been carried away on "let me just sketch out this character next...!" Oh, and my artistic muse has also been tested lately as I'm working on a giant piece of art for the Japanese studies board, and everyone is highly expectant. It sounded really fun at first, but I finally started some real work on her this weekend... and it's feeling daunting. o_o;; Those are some huge pieces of paper.

3.
Split Loyalties, like, had an explosion of reviews in the past 24 hours. *glitter* Four reviews almost as soon as the new chapter goes up... I am so pleased! (Especially because some bombshells are getting posted soon!) However, I haven't progress with the writing portion for weeks. IT DOES NOT HELP THAT MY CO-AUTHORESS IS NOT REPLYING TO MY DESPERATE PLOTTING E-MAILS. >____< It's definitely at least an 85%-15% trade off with this, which I'm sure she'd admit, too, but I would not be writing this if not for her help, so she is very much so someone I really, really need to hear back from before I continue. Alllliiiiiii, where aaaaaareeeee yoooou????

4.
Oh, that reminds of a Scooby-Doo metaphor my teacher made for Karl Marx's outlook on society: "So you're chasing the monster this whole time, and the monster is philosophy. At the end of the episode, you task off the mask, and underneath is production</u>!"
We also pass around the Marx finger puppet for discussion.

Seeing as tomorrow is the Epiphany and I'm in a good mood, I'm going to go back on the subject of my Christmas post (which people seemed very happy to rant on, and I was happy to read), and post some of the Christmas songs that I like very much:

-What Child is This
-We Three Kings of Orient Are
-The First Noel
-Come Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
-O Come Immanuel
-Hark the Herald Angels Sing
-Away in a Manger
-Ave Maria
-Angels We Have Heard On High
-O Little Town of Bethlehem
-O Come All Ye Faithful
-O Come Let Us Adore Him

Fortunately, I have never heard "The Christmas Shoes". ^__^ Sounds like it should stay that way. Well... tomorrow is my last day at home, then it's back to school with me. The start of the semester shouldn't be as busy as the second half, so hopefully I'll have time to catch up on Seirei no Moribito and Gundam Seed like I promised my friend. Or I could read all these books I'm suddenly being given.

Also on the topic of music, my mom had me pick out some things at the store today, and I'll be heading back with Beethoven and Mozart CDs! Yaaaay! I miss listening to classical music more often. Just having an opera CD gets old sometimes.

That'll teach me to look for old AMVs while I'm supposed to be studying. I accidentally stumbled on some new ones on Friday night, and now I can't get the mental image of Miaka singing "Bidily-didily-diii!" out of my head.

Even worse, I found myself watching a random episode of Jungle wa Itsumo Hare Nochi Guu, which I thought I had decided long ago was something I would never even look at again. x_x;;

So instead, last night I searched for HY music, since their songs aren't addictively catching for me yet, and I can only sing along with one of them. That worked much better and now my first term of three term papers is OFFICIALLY DONE.

Too bad that was the short one, and it's exactly on the minimum word requirement.