Living the Dream

It's about time that I fessed up what I've been up to, and mind you, it is very important, life altering things. You see, there are very few things that I have so far on the do-before-I-die list, and these are they:
1. See Mana in real life
2. See Rhapsody in concert
3. Try a macaron
The first two are almost impossible, very improbable things if you are familiar with those scenes - Mana is a Japanese visual kei musician and fashion designer that I have been obsessed with since I was 13, and Rhapsody is an Italian power metal band so great that they have even inspired Christopher Lee to start his own metal band at the age of 90. But I digress... Both are foreign musicians that live half the planet away, and have only been to the US once before (as is typical for the type of music I listen to - and I'm talking power metal/symphonic metal here - a "World Tour" consists of Europe, Asia, and South America). So I would have never dreamed that with me being at the young age of 23, BOTH would be coming to the US within 2 months of each other, on the west coast!
(And that being the case, it makes me wonder why I have not tried a macaron yet, as it seemed to be the most attainable of all 3 goals...)
So I have been plotting, plotting how to make this all work.

The Rhapsody concert will be simple - they're playing at a club in San Francisco, I've been to plenty of metal shows in SF before, not a big deal. I'm super excited to see them, I'm a huge fan of their singer Fabio, I saw him with Kamelot a few months ago and it was the best show I've ever been to in my life! And my friend Austin saw them in Utah and got a picture with Fabio and I am infinitely jealous you would not even believe, so now my goal is also to get a picture with Fabio, although I don't know how that is going to happen. I'll need to ask for advice on that one.

But Mana, I can't even describe how excited I am to finally see Mana! No one person has had a greater influence on my taste in music and fashion and gothic aesthetic as Mana has. I cosplay as Mana. I listen to his music when I'm sad. Every 13 year old has a band they obsess over and mine was Malice Mizer, and my favorite member of the band was Mana. I never expected to see him in America, especially not after he just came to LA 3 years ago and I missed it, and I especially didn't expect him back on the west coast, but guess what, he's going to be in Seattle in 2 weeks, playing a concert with his band Moi Dix Mois at SakuraCon, and I'm going! Yes, Seattle, a 13 hour drive, on Easter weekend, and I have to wake up at the crack of dawn to make sure I can get tickets to even get in to the convention, but you know what? I'm excited. I'm excited to take a risk, do something seemingly stupid, because that's what is called living your life with passion, something that I've desperately needed these past few months. So the planning begins, the hotels are booked, this is going to happen! 

And that macaron is gonna happen soon too, I swear it will!

Nerdy Home Decorating

For a brief second there, home decorating was my new internet - it was my crack. I was addicted to cleaning out closets, rearranging bookshelves and furniture and entire rooms, until eventually my energy was spent and I wound down on the couch and hey, what's this? Internet? And here I am.

I'm not especially good at decorating yet, I am still fairly new to this hobby. And with a husband who is an action figure and book collector and adamant about having those things on display in the front room, there is the added challenge of compromise. In the end, I had fun playing with themes and incorporating nerdy elements in an aesthetically pleasing way:

Putting Eddie with the concert DVD's!

Using my fancy looking university books to give a multi-tiered look on top of the cubby

Putting the FFIX figures next to colorful books and Salvadorean masks to bring out their colors

The FFVII figures with a fan backdrop

Putting my Easter decoration bunny next to Alice in Wonderland

Putting the dragon pencils and dragon statuette and next to my Slayers manga

I know, I went a little crazy there with the themes, huh? This was so much fun, I'm quite pleased with the outcome!

Sea Spray

As my old possessions that I don't remember ever existing have slowly been thrust back to me as their proper owner, I've found myself rereading my old high school books. 

The first one I picked up was The Once and Future King. And while I love Arthurian legend and the story is a classic, I found the writing to be quite dry. I never managed to finish it. 

The second book however, was Moby Dick. The writing is so rich and entrancing that it has cultivated in me a yearning for the sea. The proper ocean, I might add, not these straits that I live by, nay, there is land in sight not a mile out! I want the ocean, the scent (or what some might call, the stench) of salt and fish, to be able to taste the sea spray on my lips. Seeing the bend of the horizon, the curve of the earth over the vast body of water, and the sense of fear to know that once swept past that horizon, there would be no land in sight until you reach Asia. I've also acquired a fascination with ships - they seem almost an anachronism, still sitting on the water's surface when now we have aircraft able to fly through the air, not limited to traveling on one surface and not having to deal with obstacles that may be in the way. 

So that's my latest obsession. In other news, I've been trying to quit my internet addiction (it was getting bad) and replacing that activity with reordering my house. 

Have any of you read Moby Dick before?

Meaning

I looked up at the sky tonight and saw Orion and his hunting dogs peeking through the palm fronds above my front door. It's kind of comforting to know that at this point I've pretty much had the constellations beaten into my memory, even though my time working for the Astronomy department was not altogether a pleasant one.  The stars are my friends, and a welcome sight they were tonight. It's been a while since I've taken the time to look up on a clear night, so it seems I've rediscovered an old habit of mine of stalling outside to look at the stars. 

One of my biggest challenges right now is not having goals. Some days I'll just find myself in a stupor, thinking, what now, what's the meaning of all this? At work I file things away only to have them pulled out again, and then need to be filed back. At home I wash dishes and put them away only to pull them out for the next meal and have them end up in the sink again. It's this reoccurring cycle of actions, seemingly mundane but altogether important, that I get buried underneath sometimes.

What am I working towards? Who, or what, do I want to become? These have been questions that I've had to consider, as my life lays wide open in from of me. What I know so far is 2 things: to give things meaning, and to create. Heck, all of our lives seem insignificant at some point. But if we give things meaning, realize the worth of small things, and recognize the worth of our humble creations, our lives will be less mundane. 

So hold me to this - I need to get my butt off the computer, especially kick my habit of aimlessly surfing Tumblr or Youtube, and live more meaningfully.

I'll keep you posted. 

Rejuvenated

Dear friends, I hope you have all had a good holiday season and are rejuvenated and energized for going back to normal life. For me? New Year's weekend was the best, I spent a lot of it cleaning, surprisingly, but there's just something cathartic about cleaning your house, tossing out old things, and just clearing room to breathe. I've been in a decorating frame of mind lately, always trying to think of new ways to arrange our place but as I cleaned, I remembered the saying, "Cleaning is the best form of redecorating." So there I have it!

For New Year's Eve Matt and I just stayed at home watching anime's until midnight. I'm getting old, to the point where I find it hard to stay up till midnight (I think I even fell asleep before midnight last New Year's?) but this was just perfect, something low key, you know. 

But we watched an amazing anime the other day, it's called "Hoshi O Ou Kodomo." It's so good! Very magical, with many moments reminiscent of Miyazaki, and bittersweet - I love it. It's not out in the States yet, but when it comes out, I'm totally buying it!

The picture is of a souvenir I bought at the Dickens Fair, from the pirate booth - a ship ornament. I'm getting to be quite attached to ships these days, us living in a harbor town and all. The ring is just something I picked up at Forever 21 the day after Christmas (the lines were so freaking long it was barely worth it). I coincidentally wear it every time I go to watch Rozen Maiden with my friend, which is funny cause in the show all the dolls have a magical rose ring that contains their life essence, and I swear I'm not trying to cosplay, but secretly it makes me happy. ^_^*  

Happy New Year!

Tonight we bid farewell to 2011, a year that will always remain in my memory as the first year of my "real" adult life. 

I hope you all had a good holiday season thus far!

Here's me posing in an "alley" at the Dickens' Fair, a Victorian-style Christmas Festival in San Francisco. The atmosphere there was amazing, the decorations and building facades all made to look like Dickensian London, the people dressed up in period costumes... it was very very crowded though! (but that probably added to the historical accuracy, right?)

And I still haven't mastered the art of taking self-timer pictures, but....

I just wanted to wish you all a happy new year!

The Middle of Somewhere

Yesterday I walked to the laundry room in flip flops and a t-shirt before realizing it was nearing the end of November and it's really getting too cold for that now. November, almost over? What have I been doing all this time? Well, I can think of a few things I've done recently that I haven't blogged about yet:

1. Extreme makeover: With some outside encouragement, I realized that I have, in a manner of speaking, "let myself go" in terms of my wardrobe. So I'm getting a wardrobe makeover and receiving all sorts of neat additions to my wardrobe. I've been trying to take outift pictures but have yet to find the optimal place in my house to take them. They'll be coming though, don't worry!

2. New Hair: As a result of watching too many consecutive anime shows I decided I was tired of having black hair, and decided to color my hair for the first time in my life. Luckily, I managed to have enough common sense to not dye it the red color I was obsessing over, (specifically, Makise Kurisu's hair, from "Steins;Gate") and just got brown highlights instead. It's a nice change! Of course I worried about the effect this would have on my ability to cosplay as Mana, but we'll worry about that when convention time comes around again, right? XD;

My new hair! Apparently it looks a lot lighter in real life, according to my sister.

3. Adventure Thursdays: I've had Thursdays off this whole month, so I've been driving around with my friend and having all sorts of adventures! We went to a farmer's market I used to frequent as a little girl out past the vineyards and orchards, I got to try different kinds of Filipino food and found a place I can buy all my asian food without crossing the bridge, and I went on an Air Force Base for the first time! I love exploring, it just helps you love the place you live even more, don't you think?

So it's gonna be Thanksgiving in a few days, so Happy Thanksgiving guys! I'm excited for the long weekend, yay!