Listening to: "Somebody to Love" by Queen

Man, right when I finally find a new image I want to use for a new blog layout, my computer starts acting all freaky, and my Photoshop will NOT load -_- I will keep wrestling with it though, because I am DETERMINED to do a new layout. I like this one, but it's old, time to do something new XD

Being unemployed has done strange things to my sleep schedule. I used to go to sleep around 2am, and then get up at 7:30 for work. Now I stay up until 7:30am and then sleep until noon or 1pm or so. Same amount of sleep really (I usually wake up after 6 hours on my own unless I am REALLY sleep-deprived) but the hours are odd. I now go to sleep after the sun comes up. But what is really scary is how many people are also awake on IRC besides me. And they have jobs and school and stuff! (well ok it IS summer, but still) Not that I am complaining, it is nice to have people to talk to at 6am ^_^

Here is another random topic- Cat Politics. As I have mentioned before, I have 2 cats- Spike and Vicious. They are brothers, and are both indoor cats. They stay in my small apartment, and I feel really bad for keeping them inside, but I guess if I move to TX, they will have more room to move around. Anyway, what amuses me about my cats is their constant competition to get my attention, or to have the 'best' spot to sleep at in my apartment. This particular spot changes often (could be the cardboard box on my stereo, or the moving box with the comforter blanket in it, or the top of my monitor, or my laundry basket) but wherever the 'hip spot to sleep' is at, there is this silent battle betwen the two of them to sleep there. If one cat is sleeping there, the other cat will perch near by and just STARE and look slightly peeved. It's not like there aren't any other great spots for them to sleep in my apartment, but THAT spot is the popular sleeping space ^_^ Watching them is so funny. If Spike is sleeping there, Vicious (being the slightly smaller cat) has no problems hopping up there and trying to sleep on TOP of Spike, who usually does NOT appreciate this idea. Vicious can squeeze himself into the corner of the box or sleep partially on top of Spike for long enough to annoy Spike enough that he will eventually move. (and then proceed to perch nearby and look irked) However, if Vicious is sleeping in that spot first, Spike sometimes tries to jump up there and sleep too, but he is just too big. He is a rather bulky cat (they both turned one year old on June 24!) and Vicious will not move an inch to accomodate him, and Spike just can't get comfortable. Poor baby ^_^; He just can't win! Right now THE spot to be in my apartment is right in front of me, on top of my scanner which is directly in front of my keyboard, and is sort of between my monitor and the wall. I try to soothe bruised neko feelings by going over to my bed or table and starting to draw. The lure of paper (especially paper I am reading or or drawing on) is even MORE tempting than the Cool Sleeping Spot, so the other cat will come to me and curl up on my paper and both of them are happy ^_^ Gotta love cats!

Okay, this entry is rather boring and random, but at least it's something ^_^
Added: Tuesday, July 3, 2001 10:36 p.m.

Listening to: "Cloe" from Earth Girl Arjuna OST 1 by Yoko Kanno

Good grief, I decided to go through all the blogs I have linked and try to get caught up on what everyone else has been up to, and wow, all my links were broken ^_^ Shows you how out of date I was! So I have gone through and read lots of blogs and (hopefully) fixed all the links so they point to the proper places. Wow, there are lots of nice blog layouts out there! My layout is so old! And I am still using pitas for my blog. I have been thinking of moving my blog to Blogger" or Livejournal simply because they have more options than pitas does. Are there any other blog-like servies anyone can recommend to me? Hmm. It would also give me an excuse to make a new blog layout :) I like this one, but it has been the same for six months, which in trendy layout time is like... EONS :P Decisions Decisions ^_^ Anyway, my links should work now, yay! Gah, ok, enough procrastination, I need to go work on my comic now!
Added: Tuesday, July 3, 2001 12:38 a.m.

Listening to: "Dreams in a Pie" - music by Yoko Kanno, vocals by Maaya Sakamoto, from Napple Tale OST2.

o/~Here comes the boy with the butterfly eyes who can sing~ like the birds in the bubblegum trees~ o/~

Lookie! I am blogging again! AMAZING!

I am mainly blogging to say CONGRATULATIONS JURI!! May there be much genkiness and ecchiness for j00 and Gregly :P

As for me, nothing much is happening. I am Still unemployed (woo 2.5 months now! It's like summer vacation from school!) and I am getting pretty depressed about it now. I have been applying to EVERYTHING, but I can't even get an interview these days. I have received *2* response emails from places I have applied to, not rejecting me, but telling everyone who applied how overwhelmed they were with how many people who applied, blah blah blah. Each place had their ad up for about 5-7 days, and they got 400 resumes each. Ugh, toooooo much competition! It really sucks out there right now. Before the stock market went to hell, and companies were hiring, they would hire one person to do this job (which I could do) and one person to do that job (which I can't do yet but wanted to learn). NOW companies are all looking for one SENIOR level person who can do EVERYHTING. Argh. While I am not totally entry level any more, I am not exactly senior level either. Ah well, I send em my resume anyway.

At this point, I think I will probably move back to Texas. I am actually managing to get along okay on my unemployment insurance, but this wont last forever, and San Francisco is just too expensive for me to live in right now. My parents have been trying to get me to move back to TX for a while now, and I have been resisting, but if I don't find a job soon, I will probably finally go back there. I figure I can go back to school and train myself so I CAN do everything for all these job listings >_< Of course there so many people and places in San Francisco that I would MISS! (SF Gumi! #FY, #FS Gumi! Kinokuniya! Boba milk tea!) but considering my parents are going to move back to California in a couple of years when my dad retires anyway, I wouldn't be gone long ^_^;;; Right now my probability of moving back to TX is about 85%. Eek.

Okay, enough depressing talk :) Lets talk about web page stuff ^_^ I FINALLY updated the front page of niko-niko.net. It's a blindingly cute PitaTen layout :D I have no idea if it works on Netscape though. I feel awful about not checking it for that yet! I don't have Netscape on this computer though! It's probably horribly aligned -_- Anyway, the character's name is Misha, and she looks a lot like Rabi-en-Rose from DiGiCharat, except instead of dice and bunny ears on her head, she has entire plush bunnies on her head ^_^ And she has wings! Wings are always good in my book! The reason she looks so much like DiGiCharat style is because she is drawn/created by the same artist.

Hmm, what else.. oh, I opened up a new web page I have had in the works for a while- Fun Fun Factory! FFF is this way~ cute shoujo manga about a girl cursed to have cake fall on her head :) And she has to gather 10 (also cursed) bishounen to help break the curse. It's kawaii overload.

I am still plugging away at my online comic Okashina Okashi - Strange Candy. I can't believe it has been almost 6 months since I started it. It goes so fast! Tanzy and I have gathered an actual readership for it, I am amazed :D And the readers are nice people too, I never get any evil mean email about the comic or upset email when I can't get a comic up on time. I am so happy about that :D The comic is a lot of fun, though I still can't believe anyone actually reads it :D

That reminds me, I got to see a guy with wings on Saturday! Okay, so it was just Megatokyo's Ed, but it was funny :) He was dressed in a wig, dress, and wings. Now there is a guy who is secure in his masculinity enough to please the bunch of fangirls at the party with a little drag :D We wanted to dress Dom in drag too, but he said Hell No. (darn!) Oh well, fun party, I got to see Battle Royale again! I love this movie, it is so f*cked up XD

I have been so blog-oblivious for so long, I have no idea if everyone has already talked about Battle Royale yet (I bet Ed and Tanzy have at least!), but I like this movie! In the not very distant future (or perhaps an alternate reality) Japanese youth has become unruly and disrespectful and violent towards adults. So the adults fight back by passing the Battle Royale law that allows them to select a class of students at random, kidnap them, stick them on an island, and make them kill each other off :) They are given 3 days. Everyone has these collars on that track their movements. They are also given a bag with provisions and a weapon. Some people get good weapons (machine guns, crossbows) while other people get unusual or bad weapons (a megaphone, a pot lid). They have 3 days to kill off their classmates because only one student will be allowed to leave the island alive. If at the end of 3 days more than 1 person is still alive, the adults will trigger the collars so they explode and everyone dies. FUN XD This movie caused a big fuss when it was released in Japan (big surprise there, hah) but a new director's cut of the movie is going to be released soon. I want it XD

Ah hah! I finally got my Kaimu Tachibana Page to stop reloading over and over and over and crashing people's browsers ^_^ Really sorry about that folks ^^;; Please emial me if this problem is still happening for you. I think I got it fixed though!

Oh, Ragabash, if you read this (does ANYONE read this? I doubt it ^_^;;;) that bishy on your layout is from Yami no Matsuei :) A series filled with lots and lots of very cool bishounen ^_^

Listening to: "All By Myself" by Jamie O'Neal (from Bridget Jones's Diary Soundtrack)

Caffeine Units: 4 (hyper) calories: (I don't want to know!) resumes sent out: 4

Well, a lot of stuff has happened since my last entry. The most major thing being, of course, my loss of a job. Doh! Yeah, I was caught in one of those evil rounds of layoff so many dot.coms are experiencing. I was one of like 56 let go at the time. Bleh. I pretty much saw it coming, but I still had my fingers crossed. Oh well. I have been out of work for a few weeks now, but I still haven't found a new job. Man, the market is evil! Around the time I got my last job, I would post my resume to Monster.com and get piles of phone messages from companies. Now it's like a wasteland. And I am one of 4 people I know who are all out looking for work at the same time. -_- If I don't find something permanent soon, I'll probably go back to secretarial/temp work. I can still afford to wait a while longer though. It's sort of like a vacation XD I have been sending my resume out all over the place. I did finally get a call back from one place yesterday, for a job that sounds a lot of fun, so hopefully I will be able to set up an interview with them :) Wish me luck everyone!

Hmm what else... I am currently obsessed with Colin Firth and anything related to Bridget Jones's Diary. It's such a fun book and movie (haven't read the sequel book yet, but I should be getting that tomorrow :) I loved Colin Firth since seeing him a few years ago in Pride and Prejudice on A&E. I was thrilled to see him in this new movie, and playing a similar character :) Reading the book has started me on thinking in manner of book - the way 'Bridget' writes in her diary. Find self abbreviating sentences ^_- One thing I can identify with about Bridget is not the being single thing (well that too) but getting repeatedly asked the question you do not want to hear. In her case it's 'so, do you have a boyfriend yet?' for me it's 'so. find a job yet?' I HATE that question! I am TRYING to find one, it's not like I ENJOY not getting paid, and having to resist getting my usual plethora of manga :D getting asked that question every time I meet people makes me feel all pressured and bad. ugh ^^; Of course, I could solve this by getting some administrative job, but dammit, I want a job similar to what I had before. I haven't given up yet! I will hold out for as long as I can! Ah well, I am rambling...

My online comic Okashina Okashi - Strange Candy is back up and running on Keenspace. However I think we will be moving yet AGAIN soon. Keenspace is kinda cool, but realllly slow, and updating my page is really cumbersome. Tanzy and I have had an offer from someone else for a better home for teh comic, so we're setting up shop there. We will soon be found at www.strangecandy.net yay!

Despite my brokeness due to job situation, It looks like I will be going to Project A-Kon 12 in Dallas this June. me, Tanzy, and Dom (you people who read Megatokyo will know who he is) all wanted to go to A-kon together, so I asked my OO readers and the people on the MT boards for some help getting to the con, and put some stuff up for sale on ebay, including some original OO artwork, and people have been bidding much more than I ever expected. I am so surprised and thankful! It looks like Tanzy, Dom, and I will be able to make it! Thank you everyone! (and hey, go bid on stuff! :D hehehe. Need to try the same thing for AX.... ^__-

Okay, gotta go finish the current OO comic strip...
Added: Thursday, May 10, 2001 03:25 a.m.

And here I am for a 3rd day in a row! Geeze, my comic goes down, so all I can do is blog ^^

And make layouts. I started a sparkly nice new layout for niko-niko.net. I will try to finish it tonight after I finishe doing my taxes. I have my federal done, gotta finish up my state ^_^;;;

I went to Japantown with Steph last night! I think I did a pretty good job of resisting tankoubon, only purchasing 2 (I usually get like 8 >_<) but this time I was seduced by phonebook magazines, and I got the newish issues of Cheese (woo Miu in 'Yuuwaku Healing' is about to sleep with her bf's dad! How naughty!), Hana to Yume (No Hanakimi in this issue, but there was a lovely Hanakimi calendar!) , Ciao (the cute furoku seduced me into buying it! And now I am tempted to stay with it. No! I do NOT need another manga addiction!), and the always hard to find, always coveted issue of SOUTH *_* Wah, so pretty! Bishies! Bishies! wai! wai!

(random) I have had Coco Lee's "Di Da Di" on repeat play for way too long. I don't know if I will ever be able to stop the "didadidadidadidadidadidadida dida~ di" going through my head @_@ (/random)
Added: Thursday, April 12, 2001 01:07 p.m.

What's this? ME blogging TWO days in a ROW!?! Amazing, considering how un-bloggy I have been lately ^_^ I have been doing a little bit of blog-surfing this morning, and am really impressed by all the pretty blogs out there. Makes me want to do something with my own blog again. This thing has had the same design for quite some time, though Mr. Winged Bishy up there is darn cute :)

Juri : Wow, the hits on doroshii.com really did skyrocket aster I had my editor give the site a plug on IGN.com's scifi section . Pretty neat, the power of IGN ^_^ You're welcome ^_^

Arg, I need to finish doing my taxes tonight >_< Not much time left! I must not forget! Remind me!

So I have read a bit more about the little blog war going on. There is even a little poll about which side you agree with. I think I agree with the ESMB for the most part, but I think Saavik does have a point or two. I will say that I have a really hard time deciphering what she says, and I usually prefer a site that is easy to navigate over one that oozes pretty, but I don't think that was the main issue. It's more about public vs. private forums and reactions to criticism Oh well ^_^;; I have probably said too much already, and should keep my nose out of this heaven knows my own pages suck too >_< :X

Okashina Okashi - Strange Candy!
GRRRRR! RAR! *grows 200ft tall and starts rampaging and breathing fire*

Ahem.

I am really irked right now. Like I have been blabbing about in all my previous entries, I have been running an online comic called 'Okashina Okashi - Strange Candy'. And much to my surpise and joy, it has become somewhat popular, getting a good 2300+ hits a day- a lot more than any of my other pages. However, I just discovered a downside to all this traffic I have been getting- high bandwidth usage. My account with the people that host my domain of niko-niko.net allow me a generous 25GB of data transfer. In march, my account saw 46GB of transfer. Whoops. How thrilled I was to see the lovely bill in the mail charging for every 1GB over my limit >_< Seeing as the addition of my comic is the main thing causing this problem, I have had to take it down for a short time until we find a new place for it. I hope that my readers will understand and follow the comic to its new home, wherever that may be.

Again, like I have said before, doing my comic is so time consuming! I feel sooooo out of touch with everything! I haven't read anyone elses blog in eons, and I feel lost :( My frieds are all currently up in arms about some person's questionable web design skills (it's another one of those 'creativity vs usability' arguments. I can't comment on it, as I have not seen the pages in question) and there is this little flame war going on in their blogs. O_O Maybe all the people in the argument should get themselves a chatroom and arugue it out in realtime instead of wasting blog space for rants. Then again, that's the most fun use for blogs- rantiing ^_^

As for me, I don't feel like I have a whole lot to rant about, other than general annoyance at things like my web host. And the band that lives upstairs from me that likes to practice late at night. And the nth week in a row that Buffy and Angel has been in reruns. GRR! The comic has keept me too busy to find things to rant about too! eek!

I finished some new color artwork this week, which is good... I always feel a little sense of accomplishment when I manage to draw, ink, and color a complete picture. And I got *2* pictures done, amazing. :) This is one of them, and this is the other. yay!

Some people may notice that niko-niko.net is still in its March-pink layout scheme. I'm sorry, I haven't done anything for April yet. But hey, it kind of fits an 'April Showers' theme too! Yeah, yeah, I know. I need to do something new. Heck, look at this blog. It's had the same layout for ages! I should do some redesigning! But no, I'll keep neglecting my web pages because what should happen when OO goes down and I should have free-time to design? I find a good book to read. DOH! I just started "Kirith Kirin", a fantasy-setting type yaoi-ish novel, and it's really interesting so far. Parts of it remind me of Storm Constantine's 'Wraeththu' and other parts of Lyn Flewelling's Nightrunner books. Not that this is a bad thing! This is good ^^ I hope the book continues to be good :)

Hey fangirls, "Got Wings?" Want some? I have opened up a little cafepress store for my online comic, and in it is this great 'got wings?' stuff! Shirts, mugs, etc. Now you too can own a shirt with cute little wings on the back! Awwww, Kawaii! so go check it out!

Ahh I am so shameless! Taking time out to blog finally, and offering up an advertisement! boooo booo! Well, in non advertisement news, I found this nifty site today: mycereal.com. You can make your own personalized breakfast cereal. How cool is that? ^_^ (If you need an access code to get in, try BM08P12TN004)

I have been busy, and haven't really had much to blog abaout o.o I keep working on my comic like I have been mentioning in previous entries. o.o Steph purchased our tickets to Japan today, so the trip is finally set! Comiket, here I come! I can't wait! I need to find some good luggage to bring with me! I have been keeping an eye on the yen/dollar exchange rate, and things are looking pretty good for us! As of Friday, it was 122yen/1 dollar. Woo hoo! Last time I was there, it was 188 yen/dollar. I hope the yen rate is still good around the time of our trip. May have to start buying yen now ^^ The sad thing is that because of this trip, I have had to cut back on my Kinokuniya bookstore trips. So no more massive manga buying sprees ;_; wah! I am limiting myself to only getting Hana to Yume magazine, Cheese! magazine, and any hanakimi or HYD tankoubon that come out. Wah! This is a big cutback for me! But I am saving money, so it's all good :D

Chris Christmas Rodriguez, talk about one cool guy. He's better than Santa!

Oh my goodness, I am actually blogging again! I has been so long! my darn comic has been such a distraction. It seems like my schedule has been eat-work-comic-sleep (repeat 7x to fill the week).

Well, today is Friday, and it's a slow day at work, and I am not working on my comic until tonight, so i thought I would finally blog again. I haven't read anyone elses blogs n AGES either. I feel SO out of touch! ;_;

It's March at last, and wow, I have a new layout for Niko-niko.Net online! I was too busy in February to get a layout done for that month, but at least I have one for March. It's yet another very PINK layout. But Safety-chan is so kawaiii! I highly recomment the anime she is from- "Omishi Magical Theater- Risky/Safety". Iwatsubo Rie does the voices for both kawaii tenshi Safety and naughty Shinigami Risky. Maaya Sakamoto is the voice of the girl they are assigned to 'help', Moe-chan. Maaya Sakamoto also sings the lovely ending song. **_**
Thinking of Maaya reminds me of Yoko Kanno. I recently bought 2 more CDs with Yoko Kanno music on them- one is a Turn a Gundam live concert CD, where yoko Kanno played the piano in front of an orchestra (PRETY!) and the other is the 2nd OST for the video game "Napple Tale". Yoko Kanno did all the music forNapple Tale, and it is very good! It has a 'quirky' feel to it. OST 2 has a lot of songs named after animals :) Maaya Sakamoto sings on that CD too. So wonderful *_*

Hmm I am looking forward to a quiet weekend. I _REALLY_ need to clean my apartment. Spike and Vicious have realy been tearing it apart, and I haven't been helping. I wish I had more storage containers and supplies! (a common rant for me.... I bet if I sold my manga, I would have more room, but would I do it? Nooooooooo >_<)

Continuing my obsession with my Online Comic, I opened a cheezy cafepress store so I could sell a few items to go with the comic. I have bought myself some stuff too. I just want to see a mug with my own artwork on it. It would be cool! The comic plotline should get very funny soon. I have been borrowing the character of Dom from the megatokyo comic strip. Poor Dom has left his little office at Sega and is stuck in the world of UberTokyo. I am sticking him in dresses and igh heels. Poor guy. I am sre he wishes he was back in Megatokyo right now.!

I am so sleepy =_= I need to start getting more than 3 hours of sleep a night. This CAN'T be healthy! This is sad, I don't really have anything interesting to say. I have been sort of pondering skipping Fanime Con this year. I want to save money for Tokyo! GENKI GENI!!
Added: Friday, March 2, 2001 03:11 p.m.

Anybody wanna buy my soul? It's pretty cheap right now :)

I am so excited. In August, Steph and I are going to Japan! We're going to visit Kyoto, and then go to Tokyo and attend Comiket. I am so incredibly excited! We need to make all our plans now because August is one of the biggest travel months of the year in Japan. It's kind of scary, since we are going by ourselves, just the 2 of us, and neither of us is fluent (though I think between us we will be able to get along ok). All the planning is relaly making me hyper. We are deciding on our hotels right now. There are so many options to choose from! We may go super-cheap and stay at this one place where teh rooms are not much bigger than closets (only one step above a capsule hotel ^_^;) I want to try staying at a love hotel for one night, just to experience the cheeziness of it ^_^ (heart-shaped bed and whatnot ^_^)

Comiket should be lots of fun! It's the largest doujinshi convention in the rold, attracting like 400,000 people!Of course it will be blazingly hot in Japan in August, and that is a LOT pf people to be around in all that heat but... all that doujinshi! I MUST GET!! WAI! This means I need to curb my spending on manga here at home. I am going to try to limit myself to just getting Hana to Yume, Cheese, and any hanakimi volumes that come out in the next couple of months. No more random shoujo manga for me! LETS see if I can do it! (I doubt it, I have NO willpower....)

I am working on tomorrow's comis right now. I wonder if people are liking Ohashina Okashi or not. It's really hard to tell, we get so little feedback. The only feedback I really see are guestbook entries and posts to our forum. If you like the comic, please sign the guestbook! Thanks :)
Added: Monday, February 12, 2001 07:13 p.m.

I need to get a VCD player. My computer will play VCDs fine, but my DVD player will not. I have this set of Creamy Mami VCDs that is 54 episodes on 18 discs. That is a lot of stuff to watch! I have to sit in front of my computer to watch them, but it's just not a comfortable thing to do. I'd rather be a slug in bed and watch all this stuff, so maybe I'll get a VCD player I can hook up to my TV. Ahh the money I will spend to be lazy! I finished off that "16 year-old Bride" drama. It was predictable, but very cute :) I ordered another drama that I hope to get soon!

Thanks to everyone for visiting my online comic! :)

I think I have been too obsessed with my comic to do much of anything else lately ^_^ Well, of course I managed to get more manga (^_^;;;) but really, other than that it has been just work, comic, sleep! Work has been going okay. The only thing I can complain about in regards to it is the shuttle service that takes me from the BART station to my work. My company has contracted this shuttle service to run in the morning and evenings, taking employees from the BART station to right in front of our work building. However the shuttle service has been totally sucky. When we were in our old building it was good, but since moving to our new location in Brisbane it has been awful. I can get TO work in the mornings okay, but in the evenings the shuttle has a habit of not showing up, or being very late ;_; So many times in the last few weeks I have sat at work waiting for a shuttle, and having it now show. I hate it because I don't have a car, and no busses run by our building, so my only other ways of getting home are begging a ride off a coworker as they leave, or calling a cab, which is expensive. I need to stop buying manga and save up for a car down payment! (I have said this many times before, but do I ever do it? nooooooo >_<). *sigh*

I realized a negative result of starting my online comic- I now want to spend money on art supplies too! "Hey, I could use these pencils for drawing my comic!" etc. Not that I wasn't already bad when it comes to drooling over art supplies, but now it is much worse! This is how my shoujo manga obsession started! I began my Random Shoujo manga page so I could feature some of the cool manga I discovered. Then I started buying more and more so I could put them on the page... and the rest is history! Nothing like starting a web page or project to use as an excuse to buy more stuff! Yes, I know I haven't updated the Shoujo Manga page in a while.... gomen! I am still working on the Kaikan Phrase page!

Everyone else talks about much more interesting things in their blogs, I am so boring, I just babble the same things over and over again ;_;
Added: Sunday, February 4, 2001 02:01 a.m.

*guilt* I keep forgetting to blog ^_^;;; I have been so consumed with working on my comic Okashina Okashi-Strange Candy, that I haven't remembered to blog! Gomen! It's not that I do anything else interesting anyway though ^^ I did a lot of work on my Kaikan Phrase page, but like a dork, I want to make it as complete as possible before opening it, so while it has plenty of content, and more than a lot of sites do when they open, I just can't bring myself to open it ^_^;;;

I have also been watching VCDs of this Japanese dorama called "16-year-old Bride". It's several years old (early-mid 90's I think?) and is very shoujo-manga-ish, plotwise. Basically, Rich 19 year old girl is stuck in an arranged marriage to marry this rich guy so that their parents companies can join too. But she is a real snot, and runs away before the wedding. Her family manages to find a poor 16 year old girl who looks JUST LIKE their 19 year-old daughter, so they pay her to take their daughter's place while they look for her. So the 16-year old takes on the fake identity, and marries the rich guy, and has to deal with his family, and try to keep the secret, etc. I think it's interesting, anyway ^^ I am on episode 5 out of 10. I also ordered another VCD set of a Japanese drama about a high school girl and boy who switch bodies. I look forward to getting that one ^___^ I am a dorama-Ho! Whee!

Added: Tuesday, January 30, 2001 07:05 p.m.

As usual, I have been too distracted to blog ;_; I am sorry to all you people who check here for my ramblings (er, DOES anyone ever read this? I wonder...) I have been very busy lately! Last weekend I participated in another kamikaze shopping trip in LA. Basically, me, Thea, Niichan, and Tanzy took greyhound down to LA on friday night, got there saturday morning, spent all day being ferried aroundby Kristin in her car and managed to go to Animate, Mandarake, Asahiya, Kinokuniya, another used manga store, and a nother small anime goods store. I spent much $$$. I am never gonna get a car at this rate ^_^;;;;; Wanna know what I bought? I listed it over on my manga diary. And then I went to Kinokuniya HERE last night with Steph and Thea and got MORE manga! Help! This addiction is horrible!!!!!!!!!! The things I picked up last night included a couple new phonebook manga magazines that I haven't covered on my Random Shoujo Manga Page yet (so it was a great excuse to buy them, right? :D) volumes 2 and 3 of "My cat is a prince" (how can I resist a title like that?), Mars #1, and 2 other random shoujo things. -_-;;;

I have also been distracted by my online comic, Okashina Okashi - Strange Candy". Comic #4 went up today, yay! Go check it out!

Happy Chinese New Year! Ok, so I am a day late, but there ya go ^_^; Year of the Snake, ooh ahhh! I was born in the Year of the Tiger. ^_^

I think I will finally open my Kaikan Phrase page this wekend. It has enough stuff in it now to make it worth while, I think!

I wish I had more interesting stuff to blog about, but I don't ^_^; Um what else has been going on... I took Spike and Vicious (my cats) to the Vet on tuesday to be fixed. I brought them home yesterday, and they are acting as if nothing happened, and continue to drive me absolutely insane~! They are so curious and like to get into everything! It's hard to get stuff done when Vicious insists I pay attention to him. I think he must have the cat version of attention-deficit disorder ^^:; He will not sit still, and likes to wal back an forth between my scanner, monitor, and mousepad -_- I had hoped having them fixed would calm them down a little but no luck so far...

I should probably get back to work now. >_<
Added: Thursday, January 25, 2001 09:53 a.m.

Rolling blackouts suck! -_- Here in happy California-land, we are having an evil energy crisis that has PG&E shutting of power to people for various intervals of time. My work was hit with one of these enforced blackouts yesterday. We were sitting in the dark for 2 hours. Bleh! A lot of people left and went home to work, but I rely on the work shuttle for my transportation, so I was stuck there. Fun Fun. And me without manga to read.... (I brought some to work today just in case it happens again :D)

So Comic #2 of Okashina Okashi - Strange Candy went online today. Yahoo! Once agin, it's a character introduction strip. A couple more to go, and then things will get fun ^_^ Thanks to everyone who has gone to check my comic out! ^^

I went to Kinokuniya yesterday! I will report about what I bought over in my manga diary in a few minutes :D I am excited about going to Mandarake again this weekend! Lots of used manga for me! And I look forward to seeing the animate store too! *hops around excitedly* mangamangamangamangamangamangamangamangamanga! *boing*

Here is my daily reminder to myself to get off my lazy butt and add more random shoujo manga summaries! RAR!

My contact lenses are bothering me today -_- They feel sticky or something. >_< Ahh such randomness....

Ahh I don't have anything interesting to blog about! ;_; I haven't done anything blogworthy lately, other than the online comic @_@ How sad!
Added: Thursday, January 18, 2001 12:15 p.m.

Hihi everyone! Genki kai? I am super genki! I just found out I'll be able to go down to LA this coming weekend to go shopping at Mandarake used manga store, and the new Animate anime goods store that opened up down there too! YAY! Cheap manga! Wai! Wai! I love Mandarake! I spend way too much money there, but I get so much more for each buck! I plan to use my proceeds from my Nurse Angel Ririka CD auction (it went for $172.50!) to get manga at Mandarake :) They sell tons of doujinshi too ^_____^

I am also genki because the first installment of my new online comic Okashina Okashi - Strange Candy is now online! Go check it out! A new comic will appear every Tuesday and Thursday! Wai! Wai! *shimmer*

Further genkiness results from getting all my stuff over to my new desk at work today. It is quite a project to pack up all my junk and get it over to my new desk! I have all these anime plushies and figures, etc! ^_^ They set up my new computer at my desk too. It's a shiny new Mac cube with a 19" monitor. It's so CUTE! I need a good name for it ^_^ I still have Badtz Maru, my PC laptop to use also.

I made more good progress on my magical girls page, it will be ready to open soon! It's 90% done! And my Kaikan Phrase page is almost ready too! Ahh a great expansion time for Niko-Niko.Net ^_^

Lalalalalala I shall try to blog more later!
Added: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 04:13 p.m.

What a week! =_= In my last entry I mentioned it was late and how bad it was that I was still awake. Well yep, it WAS bad that I was still awake. I did try to go to sleep, but I only ended up getting about 1.5 hours before my alarm went off again, and I was suppoed to go to work. However I felt positively GREEN with illness that morning, so I called in sick, and proceeded to lay in a sleep-like stupor for the next 11 hours. I was so disoriented when I woke up Tuesday night! But I did feel a little better. Unfortunately I was unable to get much more sleep because my cat Vicious (who seems to be going through cat puberty right now) spend most of the evening running around my apartment howling and knocking things over. He broke one of my cereal bowls that was on my kitchen counter, and knocked down 2 of my wall scrolls. *sigh* It's hard to sleep when you hear MEOW! MEOW! *crash!* *thump* Ugh.

Wednesday was an evil day. I am at work for only a little while when my department boss calls me in to talk to him. There was about to be another big layoff at my work that day, but fortunately I would not be let go. My boss was moving me over to another department. So now I no longer work in Engineering, but am part of a visual design team doing graphic design stuff. PErsonally I am glad, this sounds like stuff I am more interested in doing anway. But the atmosphere at work was very tense all day Wednesday. We let go a good chunk of employees. Everyone was walking around like on eggshells, while people pcked up their desks and left. Ugh, I hate days like that! But I am glad I survived this round of layoffs!

I have been packing up my desk (this is taking a long time!) and will be moving over to the Design side soon. I need to go choose a cubicle over there. I think I will actually get a window spot, which is kind of nice.

The weather here has been awful. We had torrential downpurs the last day or two, keeping me in a perpetual state of damp shivering. I am still trying to recover from my illness, but it is not easy. There is also this energy crisis going on here, so we have the power company threatening to do rolling blackouts on people. Bleh.

I am so glad it is almost the weekend. I don't want to do ANYTHING. I just want to SLEEP, and recover from this cold, and try to de-stress my self. I really need a backrub, my back and neck have been so tense and tight. Ouch.

Ok, sorry for all the whining and complaining! For something more cheerful, check out my Manga diary to see a description of a manga series I am obsessed with! (another one? ^_^;)
Added: Friday, January 12, 2001 12:42 p.m.

*yawn* Why am I still awake? I got about 1.5 hours of sleep last night, yet I am still sitting here now instead of going to sleep! I don't feel like sleeping though! I am gonna regret this in the morning though. This can't be healthy, and I am still sick right now >_< Ah well...

Today was pretty uneventful. I didn't do a whole lot at work today. Mainly looking through a site to see if a bunch of changes we made recently went into effect okay, and what needed to be fixed. This did take a long time, as there were a lot of pages, but it wasn't particularily stressful. I brought some videotapes to work with me with the intent of going to Japantown after work to return them to the videostore I rented them at (they were already one day late) but the stupid shuttle bus that picks me up from work at 5:15pm and takes me to a BART station didn't show up. Then the 5:50 one didn't show up either! GRRRRRR, the video store closes at 7pm. With SF traffic and public transit, there is no way I could make it on time =_= A co-worker and I called a cab, but amazingly enough the 6:30 shuttle actually showed up (at 6:45 mind you, but it was there) so I finally got home, but I still have these darn tapes and now they are another day late. *sigh*

I rented the first tape of that ultra cute shoujo anime "Da! Da! Da!" (about a guy and a girl who are stuck living together, and have the added burden of a baby from space that lands in the yard and clings to them like mama and papa ^^;) I also rented 3 japanese dramas. The first was Yamato Nadesico, which has Nanako Matsushima in it. She is the one who played the love interest in the GTO drama, and the teacher in Majo no Joken... anyway, I don't like her character very much yet in Yamato Nadesico, and the guy I think is the 'hero' doesn't thrill me either. Bleh. Next up is a drama called Love Complex. It has Sorimachi Takashi in it! (He is the guy who plays GTO in the GTO drama :D) I swear, if Utena director Ikuhara ever directed a live action drama, this would be it. I have almost /no/ idea what was going on O_O It was just ... strange! But wow, Sorimachi looked CUTE in that business suit! *_* Finally, I rented something calle 'Style!' I am not sure what it is about because I am not interested in it enouh to watch more than the few minutes I saw at the beginning of the tape. Harh of me to dismiss it so quickly ^_^;;

I will try to get to Japantown tomorrow to return these and resist renting more ^_^; (I want more Da Da Da though! I will of course hit Kinokuniya and spend more money on manga @_@

Oh that reminds me, I am selling a Nurse Angel Ririka Heart Aid 2nd CD on ebay right now. The auction is almost over though! Doh, I should have mentioned it here sooner! This CD is out of print and really hard to find! Right now the bidding is at $147! Woo hoo! ^_____^ I also have a Nurse Angel Ririka Heart Aid 1st CD that I am going to put up on Ebay soon also ^_^ I'll be sure to mention it here this time though!

I (finally) finished my first comic strip for my new online comic 'Okashina Okashi' - Strange Candy. Yay! I have been working on a page to run the comic on (I am thinking of starting slow with like 1 or 2 strips a week, building to more maybe as I get used to it ^^ I want to finish a couple more strips before I post the first one. I want to be a little bit ahead of when I update :D

Soon I will have all of Kaikan Phrase to watch (finally!) and I will finally finish my page! So close now!

I keep saying what pages I should work on next, and then I never do it *sigh* I really do intend to update my Random Shoujo Manga page next. Steph kindly wrote up 2 new summaries for me (Thanks Steph!) that I really should add, and like I have said before, I have all these piles and piles of manga that I should summarize! I have forgotten what a lot of these are about! @_@ (and of course I just want to go buy more tomorrow. Ahh addiction...)

Hmm I have only received 2 comments (that I have seen anyway) about my January niko-niko.net layout! aww, and I made such an effort to update ontime and with something sparkly ;_; And no one has noticed! Awww...

I guess I should attempt to sleep now. Or at least cut short this rambling blog (hmm rambling log.. ramblog? ^_^;;; yes, a sign that Emi needs sleep....) Oyasumi!
Added: Tuesday, January 9, 2001 02:50 a.m.

Wow, what a week! @_@ I had a pretty good newyears, I didn't do much, which is a good thing. On Tuesday I went back to work. It was actually good to be back at work, I had been feeling a bit sluggish duringthat week I had off. But then Wednesday I had to go report to the courthouse downtown for Jury Duty. @_@ This is not my first time being summoned for Jury Duty, but it is the first time I actually had to go. Last time I was summoned was when I lived in Texas. I got out of it then because I was a university student. No such luck this time.

Basically jury duty was a bunch of sitting around. I got to the courthouse at 9am and was stuck in a big room with a bunch of other people until a group of us had our names called, and we all had to go to this other room upstairs. They had a little over 100 of us packed in there. We sat around in there for a while until the judge finally came in and told us what the case is about. A gay man was suing a large corporation for sexual harrassment. Because of the nature of this case, there may be a lot of people who could not serve as a juror (because of prejudices, etc) so they wanted to have a large group of potential jurors to choose from. They had another group of 100 reporting for the same case later that day! Then they had us all fill out questionaires that asked us how we felt about various issues and large companies, etc. After we all filled this out, we were allowed to leave, but had to report again on Friday. *sigh* another day away from work! I didn't even know what my work's policy on Jury Duty is @_@

So on Friday I go back, and the group of jurors between us and teh afternoon group had been trimmed to about 120. We were all squished in the same room again, and they called out 24 names at random to sit in the first 2 rows. Then the lawers for both sides began grilling the potential jurors about their answers to the questions on the questionaire. It was a combination of boring and startling, if you can imagine that ^^;; One of the lawyers has this very low, slow voice, so it was like watching paint dry. But then they would pry into some of the personal answers to the questions right in front of all of us @_@ So we all had to hear various opinions on sexual harrassment, homosexuality, religion, large corporations, personal mental illness, etc. Oro. About 5 hours later, they finished questioning the first group, and amazingly enough, the lawyers managed to get 12 jurors from the first group of 24 people. But they had to call more random names to be questioned so that they could get some alternates. Fortunately I wasn't chosen then either. So all I ended up doing was sit around all day listening to this. Bleh. I think I would have actually enjoyed being on the jury for this case, but it is 6 weeks long! I don't think I could afford to be away from work for so long! I have rent and bills and stuff. At least I am now excused from Jury Duty for a year.

All day friday I had this nagging little cough that turned into full-blown illness Saturday and today. I feel miserable. I am coughing and wheezing, and I have a fever =_= My chest hurts from all the coughing, and I have a headache too. Ugh! But I am going back to work tomorrow darnit! I have missed too much!

Page-wise, I have continued to make great progress on my Kaikan Phrase page! It's day it was 90% ready to be opened to the public Woo hoo!

Anime-wise, I finished off Jubei-chan with DVD #4, watched CCS DVD vol 2, and Dual DVD 2. I REALLY need Dual DVD 3! The series is getting interesting now! Must have more! I still have some more DVDs to watch, namely the original BGC on DVD box set. I have to find stuff to review for IGN this week. Hrm....
Added: Sunday, January 7, 2001 08:20 p.m.

Well Happy New Year everyone! Ready for 2001? Does everyone have resolutions for the new year? I have a couple, but I don't think I will mention them here :D I was invited to a party tonight, but I didn't feel much like going. I dunno, I kind of prefer to spend new years by myself. Strange, I know ^_^;; I didn't have a ride to that party anyway, and I don't feel comfortable having to depend on someone else for a ride when going to a party where there will be alcohol.

So, having nothing else to do today, I worked on one of my web pages, the Kaikan Phrase one. It is almost done enough to open to the public. I have this desire to make it as complete as possible before opening it. I have going to new sites linked to the anime turnpike, only to find a bunch of 'under construction!' and 'coming soon!' pages. ARHGH! Don't open your pages/link them to the Turnpike if you aren't done with them! Hehehe ^_^;; So I made much progress today. I have been wallowing in cheezy Lucifer music and smutty manga, what fun ^_^

Every year at new years, they always have those music countdowns where they show the best music videos of the year, or songs on the radio, etc. I watch/listen to those things every year. I feel so out of it this year though. I have no idea who the popular groups or songs are these days. Normally I listen to the radio when driving to work and keep up with current music that way. But this year I haven't had a car. AND I haven't had cable until recently, so I haven't been watching MTV or VH1. So I am watching this music video countdown of the best music of 2000, and I am clueless about all these songs >_<. I remember, listening to the top 105 songs of 1985 on the radio way back when, and thinking that 1985 had to be the best year EVER for cool music. I am almost inclined to think the same thing this year ^_^ Well ok, I like a lt of stuff on the countdowns this year, but it's all so much more.. flashy.. than it used to be. Ack, I sound like an old person ^_^;;;

Thinking of the 1985 music countdowns started me thinking about old MTV, back when they used to play *gasp* videos. I remember before and right after MTV first came on the air, and they used to run all those commercials with popular musicians shouting "I want my MTV!" and telling everyone to call their local cable company to get MTV in your area. Ahh the memories ^_^ And I remember some of my favorite MTV VJs, like Martha Quinn and Kevin Seal. Kevin Seal was the greatest! ^_^ And of COURSE I remember the classic commerical they always ran on MTV for Freedom Rock with those hippie dudes. "Hey man, is that Freedom Rock?? WELL TURN IT UP!!!" And whatever happened to Randy of the Redwoods, anyway? Why don't they let Weird Al Yankovic take over MTV any more? I remember there would be a few days where they let Weird Al take over the channel and change it into AlTV, and he would host and show all sorts of strange commercials, like the one for Dog Police, or Fish Heads... Ahh excuse me, I am going on a memory trip again :D

Well, I am about to upload the new years layout for Ninko-Niko.net, so go check it out in a few minutes ^_^

Happy New Year!
Added: Monday, January 1, 2001 12:54 a.m.

Yay, I had fun at KourinKon! And now I have made it home and have uploaded some pictures from it XD And here is our cross-dresser, Vu. First he resisted Katie's pleas to dress up, he eventually gave in, though he looks very surly about it (and Katie looks so evil! :D)

I saw an awful lot of Initial D yaoi doujinshi tonight. A lot of it was really pretty. I am almost tempted to start watching the show now too. Everyone here is hooked on teh darn series. I had rented some of it a couple years ago, but I had to stop watching it at episode 1 because I thought the CG was just too awful. But apparently if you ignore the horrible CG, the series is actually pretty good. Ir insanely slashable at any rate, judging from the doujinshi I saw. And hey, Koyasu and Seki do voices in it, so that alone is a temptation to watch ^_^ I wonder if anyone has any I can borrow ^_^

I wish I could sing. Sure I can make ok web pages, and I can draw fanart, but man, I can't sing to save my life. I can scare animals and break windows with my voice. Tonight's KourinKon karaoke reminded me just how bad my voice is. Sure, I can muddle along fine when we all sing X-Japan's 'Forever Love' (I can picture the karaoke video that goes with this song- the one with the mountain climbers who get hit by cars and otherwise maimed ^_^ And of course there is the classic FFFUUUUUUUMMMAAAAAAA!!! yell ^_^), but with most other songs I am awful. At this party we had people who could sing 'Voices' from Macross Plus so beautifully, or some Maya Sakamoto songs from Escaflowne. And May can rap the fast version of the Initial D opening song. Wow! *envy*. Ahh well, it's nice to listen to them anyway ^_^

Ok, sleep time for me, oyasumi ^_^
Added: Friday, December 29, 2000 04:06 a.m.

@_@

Oh hohohohohoh! There is much to be afraid of when a huge group of super genki anime fangirls converge upon one defenseless house. I am here at KourinKon2k, a super genki gathering at Rin's house. And, like I said, there are a whole bunch of fangirls here. What is really scary is that there are about 3 guys here, who are sadly outnumbered. Oh, have I mentioned that the large group of fangirls here likes yaoi? Hohohohoho! Poor guys. You KNOW that at one of these gatherings the night will NOT end without one of the guys being forced to dress in drag, whether he wants to or not ^_^;;; We are an evil fangirl armada, I tell you! XD The unfortunate victim tonight is Katie's brave boyfriend, Vu. He looks quite charming in Rin's old prom dress and a wig we somehow managed to find. We even have makeup and a bra on him. Oh Vu struggled for a while, but like the hapless gazelle when chased by a pack of wolves, he eventually became worn out and submitted to our cross-dressing fetish ^_^;; This sounds sort of sinister, but Vu is actually a very good sport :D And he is a champ for putting up with it. And aww, he looks so cute! I will post the pictures I took with my digital camera when I get home :D I think we should dress Packrat up next. He has that really long Duo hair :D~~~

There is a lot of sugar (pixy stix), alcohol (beer) and more sugar (caffeinated beverages) floating around here. That is enough to make us silly :) I don't like beer, but I have had plenty of pixy stix. Artifically colored sugar, oh yeah~~~ ^_^ And here I am blogging. I think if you check the blogs of a lot of the RL friends listed to the right, you will see blog entries from them mentioning KourinKon. Yes, we are all geeky enough to pause to blog in the middle of a party ^_^ I am NOT going to Karaoke, and I suck at video games, so I will just run around being silly =) Ja ne!
Added: Thursday, December 28, 2000 10:12 p.m.

*Listening to: "Vitamin Love" from Kodomo no Omocha (Sana-chan and her Idol singing group ^_^)*

=_= My sleep schedule is all messed up. All week I have been unable to get to sleep until early in the morning, causing me to sleep in very late. This is awful. I tried going to sleep early, and ended up only being to nap a little while, leaving me wide awake even later now. I hope I can get myself back on a decent schedule before I have to go back to work! I think my Christmas present of a new coffeemaker may be the cause of this problem ^_^;;;; But I love hazelnut coffee! And I won't drink decaf! RAR!

Now that I can finally get back to work on my pages, I am trying to decide what to work on first. There are pages I am always saying I need to work on, but then I never do, or I find other pages I am behind on too.. hmm lets see:

Mizuiro Jidai- This page needs a lot more info added, but I don't think I will touch this page for a while ^_^;

As you can guess, I have quite a lot to do. @_@ And what is this? I want to start MORE pages? No! STOP ME! PLEASE! >_<

I think I will go try to sleep now ^_^;

Now listening to: "Don't Stop!" - Idol Project Opening Song
Added: Thursday, December 28, 2000 03:46 a.m.

Excuse me while I kick my new layout a few times. Grrrrr, behave you!
Added: Wednesday, December 27, 2000 05:33 p.m.

Hey look, I changed my blog layout and archived again :D Yahoo, I have my new computer, monitor, AND scanner all hooked up! All I need is DSL, and I'll be totally set! I love Tsubasa, my new computer! It is so wonderful! *shimmers happily* I feel so productive now ^_^ I already have my layout for January niko-niko.net done, so I won't be fretting at the last minute, and I have finally begun work on my online comic I want to start. Progress is slow, but I have started at last!

Did everyone have a good holiday? Mine was fun. I went over to Keiti's house and spent Christmas day with her family. There was much good food and video games ^_^ Her family was even kind enough to get me a few gifty! *shock* I need to send them a thank-you card right away ^_^

I think I will go blog-surf now, I have been very behind on my blogging, and I must see what everyone has been up to! Oh, yeah, I got my digital camera set up to work with Tsubasa, and I uploaded this picture of Spike and Vicious, my two kittens. This pic was taken a couple months ago. They are still not fully grown, but are a bit bigger than this now. Aren't they adorable? ^_-

ja ne!
Added: Wednesday, December 27, 2000 05:21 p.m.

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