[#Sunday, August 3, 2003#]
np: Koi wa A LA MODE - Tokyo Mew Mew
Hrmm...exactly twenty days till college. Doki doki doki, and all that.
I'm basically done with shopping. I have new clothes and (minor?) appliances. This morning my parents yelled at me to help them empty out the car, and I walked out to find a brand new 120 gig computer with all the trappings in the trunk. I'm really optimistic about my roommate.
I'm remembering back to the early tour, when the campus life supervisor came to give a speech about moving in. He said parents often asked if they should rent the small U-haul or the one the size of a truck. Then he made a case stating that since we didn't need to bring any form of furniture and the dorm rooms are the size of a cracker box anyway, everything we need for college should fit comfortably into the passenger seat of a Miata.
Clearly, the campure life supervisor has never come into contact with a teenage girly-girl.
Mom: *doubtfully* Maybe if we fold down half of the backseat.
Jack: But just the computer stuff alone takes up so much space, and we're not unpacking it from the boxes...
Mom: Well, but how much else is there? There's all the stuff we bought, and the minifridge, and her clothes...
Meimi: OHMYGOD MY CLOTHES. *horror* And my SHOES. I didn't even think of this. How am I going to fit all of them into those tiny closets they give us?! ...how will we fit all my clothes in the CAR?!
Mom: ...let's get prices on renting an SUV.
Meimi: *hyperventilates* My purses. My manga. My artbooks. Every copy of In Style magazine I own. My CDs. My art supplies. I repeat, my CLOTHES...
a sorta fairytale @ 07:56 p.m.
[#Saturday, July 26, 2003#]
In other news, I was very well-sunscreened at Disneyland, except on my back shoulders - an "out of sight, out of mind" deal. I am now in some serious pain.
got home to a message from Ali saying that her family is going to Taho and do I want to come? Of course she left earlier today. I called Les to find out if she'd gone, and she went into hysterical laughing fits and told me that she was too busy with Obon festival prep to leave, but Ali's family had kindly offered to pick her up at the airport if she wanted to buy a plane ticket and fly up there shortly afterward. So instead, we're going to see the pirate movie on Monday! Two times? Not enough. Not sure if three will be either.
a sorta fairytale @ 11:38 p.m.
[#Saturday, July 26, 2003#]
Went to Disneyland for a day while picking up my brother. I had a total blast with my parents, really - they have this new thing where you reserve tickets for all the really popular rides, and you get a timeslot of about an hour. During that hour, there will be basically no waiting if you have your ticket. This is great beyond words - we got to go on every popular ride there, waiting for an average of maybe seven minutes on rides that usually take forty-five minutes.
Obviously the pirate ride was ten times more fun than it was before, except I haven't been to Disneyland since about sixth grade (well, I went two months ago, but most rides were closed for graduation night)...and you remember all the special effects/magical stuff as being completely real. When you come back a jaded teenager years later, it can't help but be disappointing. Suffice to say I was both shocked and emotionally crushed that the flames in the burning city were not real - I kept trying to figure out how they operated the flame throwers in the background when I was seven.
Plus, I was expecting to find oodles of pirate merchandise. It turns out, they've made
nothing for that movie. The only pirate stuff for sale was the ordinary things they had for the ride, already. I was tempted by a plasticy scroll with the lyrics to "Yo Ho, A Pirate's Life For Me" printed on it with snazzy plastic skull graphics, but it was the typically obscene $25 Disney price (for a sheet of what is essentially LAMINATED PAPER?!). But I did spend $25 on a pirate shirt. Mmmm.
The good news, though, was that they did have plenty of movie stuff left hanging about from the premiere party they had on the ninth. So, the show windows all over the park were filled with promotional photos and props from the movie! This was exciting enough (I ran around gushing over the props with their plaques: "Actual boots worn by Geoffery Rush!" "Actual fan used by Keira Knightley!" Sadly no actual gay hat worn by Orlando Bloom, pity), but it turned out The Disney Gallery had an entire display...
I was
so giddy over this stuff. I'm such a behind-the-scenes movie geek anyway - DVD extras rock my world, etcetera. They had all these rooms filled with the original conceptual sketches for the actual ride. Then they had paintings and sketches for the movie (of which they were selling obscenely expensive prints - the only one they sold that I considered particularly impressive was a painting of the skeletons walking underwater, and it wasn't exactly something I wanted on my dorm wall - I want Johnny Depp, damn it!). Then, one more room had me completely delighted: it contained some really impressive props on display, as well as costume/character designs and conceptual sketches. The props included: the fancy white dress Elizabeth wore, Jack's costume, the compass, the guns, three of the swords, and outside in the cafe was the...I feel so ignorant; the sculpture that goes at the head of the boat? Yeah, that, the scuplture that was at the head of the Black Pearl. Absolutely huge and gorgeous! The conceptual sketches completely blew me away as well. They had the main sketches for the trio, a
gigantic one of Barbossa in skeleton-mode, and a really great one of the evil zombie monkey!
I tried to take pictures of all of the above, but everything save the costumes and the statue outside was encased in glass, and the flash on my camera refused to turn off. So between overexposure and the light bouncing off the glass, I'm not sure anything will turn out. But if it does, shall post pictures!
a sorta fairytale @ 10:54 p.m.
[#Tuesday, July 15, 2003#]
Fic I think everyone needs to read - I've seen this done before, but never done
well, and now that I've found it...
Once More, With Feeling: HP Style.
Ingrid, even you would like this. All the lyrics rhyme and match the songs perfectly, and the dialogue is perfectly revised to be hysterical. ("Harry, I-I've...killed chickens." "It's okay. They're just vegetables, with feathers." Or! "...I gave birth to a thestral." "Wicked! Did it sing?!" Or! "I mean, I'm not exactly shaking in my Quidditch kit, here, but there's definitely something dodgy happening to us, and I don't think it's going to lead to Butterbeer and Chocolate Frogs.")
a sorta fairytale @ 03:57 p.m.
[#Saturday, July 12, 2003#]
Went to a sleepover party for Velvet's birthday. We decorated Kathy's house with dorky party favors (Barney signs, Barbie hats, and Elmo balloons). Then we had cake and watched French Kiss. Then today we went to see the pirate movie. I continued to marvel at the way Elizabeth's lipstick and mascara were always perfect, no matter how many times she got dunked in the ocean. Kept sighing at Orlando Bloom's attempts to play a straight boy; does not work at all. I mean, check out that
hat. When Elizabeth took it off to kiss him, Ali muttered, "THANK you," at the screen. And when they did kiss, Velvet yelled, "FINALLY! WE WAITED TWO AND A HALF HOURS FOR THAT!"
In other news, I must ashamedly admit that Smallville is my new Thing. I'm downloading the show from the beginning so that I'll be all caught up by the time the new season starts...the other night, I was watching an episode around five AM, and something went boom to send Lex flying into Clark. And I screeched, "HANDS! HANDS IN NEW PLACES!" Um.
a sorta fairytale @ 11:39 p.m.
[#Friday, July 11, 2003#]
Ingrid? I love you.
a sorta fairytale @ 03:42 p.m.
[#Friday, July 11, 2003#]
I am beyond pissed off right now.
I really want to say just FUCK OFF and don't bother to pay a cent for my college. If college was entirely my responsibility, I would. But it's more Mom's than mine, and she deserves to have that bastard chip in, because with all the moving we did for most my life because of his job, she was never able to move up the pay scale. So the fact that it's hard is really all his fault, and he ought to pay for it.
But I'm mostly furious about his total invasion of my privacy - if I wasn't already livid, I am now - and being ambushed at my private email address which nobody gave him, and I want to know how the fuck he got it. I don't appreciate this. At all.
Hate him. Really.
a sorta fairytale @ 01:27 a.m.
[#Thursday, July 10, 2003#]
np: Evenstar - Lord of the Rings
Went to see the pirate movie today for my mom's birthday. It was good, except for the directing, which was crappy...and the sets didn't exactly feel beautifully authentic, either. A lot of the time it looked more like a TV special than a movie. But I loved the way the scenes kept giving little winks to the ride at Disneyworld. Johnny Depps' entrance reminded me of Haru's in Furuba. He owned that movie, by the way. His dialogue was flat-out wonderful (I honestly think I laughed once a minute on the average), but his performance was better: I haven't sparkled at an actor having such
fluid movement since, well, Orlando Bloom or Cate Blanchett in LotR. Although it was, of course, a completely different kind of movement since Johnny Depp does not prance like Legolas.
Anyway, it's quite a fun summer movie. It's not going to win any awards, but Johnny Depp probably deserves one. It wasn't Orlando Bloom's movie, at least. ^^
a sorta fairytale @ 12:29 a.m.
[#Monday, July 7, 2003#]
np: A Sorta Fairytale - Tori Amos
I keep setting out to make a cute! cute! cute! possibly pink! Hanakimi layout, but even though my bed has Hanakimi volumes all across the bedspread...somehow I ended up with this. But that's okay, because Kaji/Misato is a huge favorite of mine. I only wish I'd made the image of her holding the gun to his head more obvious among all the raburabu images. Because there's something really cool about how Misato can drunkenly pour her heart out to him one night, and then march into work the next morning and dish out the death threats all businesslike. At least, I think so.
a sorta fairytale @ 02:40 a.m.
[#Saturday, July 5, 2003#]
Okay. Now they're going off about one every other second. There were about twenty in a row a minute ago, which led up to a huge firework explosion that definitely set off a car alarm. I heard it. And now there's more.
Might I add, this firework extravaganza is in *back* of my house. So I get all the mind-numbing pain of the headaches, without any of the pretty sparklies. God, my HEAD.
a sorta fairytale @ 12:52 a.m.
[#Friday, July 4, 2003#]
How can
anyone have enough fireworks to be setting them off at all hours of the day and night (up to and including four AM) for a
week?! And one just went off so loud that the ground actually fucking
shook. I think I heard a car alarm, or at least a car momentarily freaking out.
It's not that I hate fireworks. I hate them being shot off in a backyard about twenty feet away from my window.
a sorta fairytale @ 10:45 p.m.
[#Tuesday, July 1, 2003#]
np: Donna Toki Demo Anata to Mezametai - Yuu yuu Hakusho
Ooh, I remember when I bought the CD with this song. I found it used in a bookshop, I think in Kyoto - I really only bought it because, hey, Ogata Megumi. But I love this song probably more than I should - I kept insisting to my friends that her voice "sounded like an angel". ^^;;;
Kids around the neighborhood have been putting off fireworks at all hours of the day and night for the past week. Wish I could figure out the direction the noise is coming from so I could pummel them.
I spent today at Tara's house as a going-away party for Sara (Italian exchange student). Except I didn't really know her that well, I think I was just invited by default because of Tara. Was somewhat awkward as nobody else showed up except Ali. After she had to leave, Tara and I ranted about HP5, especially all the various plotholes (speaking of which: did I just
miss the explanation of how the entire Ministry of Magic was randomly emptied during the end of the book? and how everyone showed up at the end after the fighting was conveniently over with? if it's that easy to clear out the Ministry, why didn't Voldie do it
before?!). Then I came home and tried to tidy up the house, but ended up laying face-down on the floor and taking a three-hour nap. ^^;;
a sorta fairytale @ 08:32 p.m.
[#Sunday, June 29, 2003#]
np: Shell - Witch Hunter Robin
Never fixing my sleep schedule, EVER.
Bound, the web manga I draw with
Shiori, has been updated with the end of chapter three. It includes angst and red ribbons, and I'm pretty sure everyone who reads this blog likes both those things. (This is the part where I stare hopefully at
Ingrid.)
Plus, we've added the
Bound ML, for any Bound goodness you want and aren't getting. Will include update notification and hopefully discussion, gushing over Mamoru optional.
a sorta fairytale @ 06:59 a.m.
