riddikulus☆aesthetics
just another day in the life of a fangirlArchive for January, 2008
Boa’s upcoming US debut & the joys of exams
So, like big K-pop stars Rain and Se7en, Boa’s having a US debut?! But at least she kept it under wraps. Haven’t seen much from the other two yet (too much hype, and nothing to show for it).
I haven’t listened to her more recent English-version songs. The last I listened to was her renditon of “A Whole New World” from the Anyband concert in very low streaming quality, but I’m not going to count that since it wasn’t a studio version *__* So I don’t know if her English has improved vastly since, oh I don’t know, 3 or 4 years ago? I hadn’t realized that some of the words in “Lose Your Mind” were in English until I looked them up… accents are difficult to get rid of and I find them adorable (my Sang-Jang sounds so cute! =3), but her English isn’t that clear to me.
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Tomorrow is going to be some major rapage. Cognitive psychology exam 10am, Japanese grammar quiz 1pm, then quantitative methods 2pm. Then crash. Cause I’m not gonna get much sleep tonight =/ I’m hiding away in the library until closing, leaving only for food. And leaving my precious computer in my room. Cutting off all temptations. No reading manga, watching videos, perusing blogs, etc.
Ahhhh~~~ The phone is dying too so I need to run back and charge it for a bit.
Dell’s horrible battery life
As many people have said, Dell laptop batteries have a shitty life. My laptop was always plugged in except for when I used it to take notes in class. After a little over a year of constant use, life on my 6-cell Inspiron E1505 battery dropped from 4 hours to 1. Having wi-fi on severely shortens it. It was to the point where my laptop would cut off after 40 minutes, and that’s with wi-fi off and the screen on the dimmest setting. Ah, the days of taking notes in class and fretting over the time left on the battery. Some days I would be screaming at the professors (in my head of course) to hurry and flash the rest of the day’s lecture slides before my laptop died. Then, after 1 year and 5 months the battery would last 20 minutes max =/
A few weeks ago I finally got a new battery. Had to shell out $120+ for this new baby though… But, there’s nothing like sitting in bed with your laptop unplugged :) Especially if you have a lofted bed. Because those dangling cords are pretty awkward. Really, Dell. I can’t afford to pay over $100 a year for a new battery!!
So now I have to think twice about buying another Dell laptop. My parents have mentioned that they want to buy me a new one, since I’ve had a few major problems with my current one. I’ve used nothing but Dell computers, so I’m kind of hesitant to branch out there. Don’t want to touch HP either. I’ve helped my cousins fix theirs way too much throughout the years. The thing is, if I buy a new PC laptop it would come with Vista…. Pretty, but system intense. And are more programs compatible with it?! I haven’t read up on it since its initial launch, so maybe by now it’s cons have been improved.
My mom even asked me how I felt about Macs. Ooh. Very pretty. And light, weight wise :D But using them seems so counterintuitive to me. The first computers I learned to use were Macs, and for some reason I could not get the hang of them. I didn’t understand how to use a computer until we got a desktop PC. And now, when I use someone else’s Mac, I’m so lost. Windows just seem so straightforward to me. I simply like how everything is structured. However, since Macs can run Windows now… I will definitely look into it O:)
DBSK/TVXQ’s “T” album
OhIamsofreakingbehind :O Yes I should get back to studying. But “music is my life” (sorry Epik High and SG Wannabe) =P
Their latest Japanese album T was released just last week, and even though I’m not a rabid fan (yet, since I haven’t allowed myself to ferment in DBSK fandom), I’m still rather excited. The few songs that I previewed sound good, and I really liked Last Angel with Koda Kumi (the album version is Koda Kumi-less). I have their past 2 Japanese albums, Heart, Mind and Soul and Five in the Black. Both were good, but I liked HMS a lot better. The bonus acoustic tracks were really nice since they have such beautiful voices *_*
Looks like it might be awhile before I can listen to the album though. My connection is so slow today.
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On a personal aside (I am too lazy to make a separate entry), I tore my last contact =( Yes yes, very sad. It was actually more frustrating since I had spent so long cleaning it, then suddenly tore it cleanly in two. I had to spend the next half hour hunting for any pair of contacts (I sometimes had old pairs in old cases scattered about), and finally found one. Huzzah! After cleaning that glorious pair for an eternity, I could finally put them in without burning my eyes xD
… oh crap I just realized that my eye doctor’s office just closed. I was going to order them today but got sidetracked.
Erg. And I need to order my new yoga pants from Victoria’s Secret too, since the semi-annual sale online ends tomorrow. Nice of them to send me an email to remind me :)
Market food isn’t too unhealthy
But then again, I shop at that lovely healthy one on campus that sells organic foods/biodegradable products. Hooray Peabody. The freshmen next year will be so spoiled >.>
When it comes to market food, I usually get either a) Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup (or some variation) or b) one of Annie Chun’s prepackaged meals. Now, Annie Chun’s meals are decent if made correctly. I just usually cook them 1/2-1 minute longer than recommended, since I like my noodles soft and not still bent into the packaged shape. For the Noodle Bowls I usually get the Kung Pao noodles because it’s remotely spicy. Teriyaki is second, and the Pad Thai is just disappointing after having real pad Thai.
For the Soup Bowls I’ve tried the Miso Soup and liked it, but real miso soup is just so much better. After watching part of the No Reservations Korea episode yesterday, I was in the mood for Korean food :) So I got the Korean Kimchi soup. Hm. Definitely prefer real kimchee as a side with bibimbap. Ooh… I want real Korean food so bad right now.
I’ve always really liked Annie Chun’s Spicy Szechuan flavored Noodle Express meals (enough to have it 3 times this week, my meal schedules were so off that I had to live off of market food). But after seeing Tony trying authentic Szechuan noodles (was this in the Singapore episode or the Asia special??), I want to try them.so.bad. Why do you torture me so, dear Tony?! =(
Oh, Honest Tea’s First Nation Peppermint is soo refreshingly good *__* So minty! I love those teas. Bad for my teeth (been bleaching them sporadically), but still love them. And I was very saddened to today to see that the market was all out of Fage Total yogurt! Tried the cherry and honey ones just once each, but the peach is the best. They give you just the right amount of peach to stir in with the yogurt. The peach is so sweet and the yogurt itself is more tangy than the plain yogurts I’ve had. So, mixed together and you’ve got bliss ♥ Simply the best yogurt IMHO. It was hard to have a bad day after having this little cup of heaven. I was so glad that I discovered it after coming here, and even more glad that I could buy it using meal money. Because $2+ per small cup of yogurt would make me penniless in no time.
But we all know that Vandy loves to jack up the prices. It’s over $2 for a bottle of POM (the Pomegranate Peach Passion is so yummy~), but at Publix it’s 2 bottles for $4. Maybe I need to stock up… and maybe I should get my mom into the Fage Total yogurt so she can order in bulk ^__^
Ah, food~~ In Japanese today we were talking about the department stores, and spent a lot of time talking about the food department in the basement floor (デパチカ). Can’t wait to go and experience all those yummy desserts she was talking about~!!
If penguins can’t kill me, then strong winds can =(
An hour ago I left the library and headed across the street for dinner. Okay. I knew that there were severe showers today, but I didn’t know that the winds would be so severe. I guess I should have paid attention to the google news popups with headlines such as “Severe Weather Alerts for Across the Nation.” But wow. I had never been so afraid that I would be blown away off the sidewalk and into incoming traffic, and I’m definitely bigger than a pregnant Nicole Richie. Needless to say, it was kind of scary. And my flimsy umbrella was useless against that.
And then, just as I was saying, “Watch, something’s gonna hit me in the head” along flies a small branch and whacks me in the forehead. It hurt. I think it’s turning into a bruise. But thank goodness for bangs =/On the way back to the library we spotted a large rectangular metal piece caught in the branches of a tree, dangling over the walkway. Probably wrenched from the unfinished building next door. I feel sorry for the poor guy that gets smacked in the head with that.
I’m sitting here trying to do work, and all I can think about is wanting to watch Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations. I got addicted to it over winter break. Apparently my whole family has taken to the Travel Channel, since it is one of the few entertaining channels on our basic cable lineup at home. I love Tony. He’s a badass MF and he’s not sorry about it. The network has been advertising that the new season (season 4) is airing Mondays 10pm ET/PT. I was so excited coming back, since I thought that I would be able to catch it.
But no. This school hates me. We freaking have HBO, but not the Travel Channel!!! T_T So I have now resorted to watching my beloved Tony in very pixelated form. I’m dying to watch the first half of the Asia special and to catch the Japan episode. Spring break is coming up soon, so maybe they’ll marathon it during then? Unlikely. But I can only hope.
Image credits: weather.com
Insurance companies and their ebilness
Yes, I am still alive. Really, I was doing good on the blog everyday thing. But then I realized that I had two exams coming up this week. And on the same day nevertheless. Oh joy. Japanese is bit of a pain, and we’re actually moving really fast this semester through grammar and with 2-3 quizzes each week. And speaking of week, there are 3 weeks left until midterms then spring break!! O_O Oh dramas. Wait for me till then~~ ♥
I need to catch up on all my work so I can do some work-work. Then I can get paid, because lately money’s been flying out of my bank account. My insurance company accidentally dropped me since they just realized that I am over 18 (how old did they think I was last year?! o.0) and they mistakenly thought that I wasn’t a full time student. I had my dad fax in confirmation of my full-time status, so that’s taken care of. But the thing is, they’re taking a really long time to pay off my medical bills from last year -_-;; 2007 was not a good year for me, health-wise.
My last pair of contacts that I’ve been using since the beginning of winter break (aka, I’ve been using them long past its life), is giving me so much trouble. I spend about 15-20 minutes each day cleaning them with the daily enzyme cleaner and then regular solution. Otherwise, the contact would burn my eyes.. So I called home to hustle my dad about resolving this with the insurance, and was told to pay off my current account with the eye doctor and order new contacts. Then the insurance company would reimburse me back.
I don’t know how long that’s going to take. They just paid off my hospital bills from last summer =/
In other news, the rain is really terrible today. I’ve had a humongous headache ever since the semiformal on Saturday (I had hit my head really hard on my metal lofted bed before getting ready for the event), which was further aggravated by the impending rain. Something to do with sudden and drastic changes in air pressure. I get really airsick too. The plane ride to Germany was tortuous that one year. The barfbag and I became rather close friends.
Peabody smelled really off, and today I noticed that the campus actually sloped from Wedgewood/Blakemore towards Edgehill. So, I walked out from North’s 2nd floor entrance and encountered the miniflood that streamed down past. Not pleasant. The bottom of my jeans can testify.
But I do have good news to report despite all this negativity (this is where I go </ rant>). I have managed to do yoga in relative peace and quiet with no distractions…. in my dorm! For free! The trick is to use a study room when no one is using it (at odd hours throughout the day, like 7am as I have managed to discover). Push all the furniture to the side, dim the lights, and you’ve got your own personal studio. But with Rodney Yee as your instructor. On a 15.4″ widescreen.
If only the room wasn’t so darm warm. Yesterday I thought I was going to faint (or maybe I was severely out of shape). And today it smelled strongly of stale urine >_< I have no idea why. It’s an all girl’s dorm. So, why?!
I can be killed by a penguin..
I started re-reading Penguin Revolution today since it’s been a while since I last read it. And I never finished it. The story is cute so far and the artwork is pleasant. I really like her style and admire her line art. She strikes a good balance between it and the screen tones. She also did Yoroshiku Master and Land of the Blindfold, both of which I really enjoy. Her stories are light romantic comedies. Haven’t encountered any angst or dark themes in them so far.
Somehow, shoujo manga tends to have a dark-haired guy and a light-haired guy for the two main romantic interests. I suppose this visual distinction is need to show how radically different the female’s possible choices are. I tend to like the studious, more serious, and quiet one :)
One of the splash pages for chapter 1 of PR was comparing the height of Yukari and an emperor penguin. And according to the manga-ka, the penguin is almost as tall as Yukari. So I checked with Wikipedia and compared:
- Emperor penguin: 120 cm -> 48 in.
- Me: 60 in.
!!! The penguin is really almost as tall as me! O_O Haha. Now that I think about it, I never got to see March of the Penguins. A couple of years ago for some reason it seemed that a lot of penguin-related movies came out around the same time.
Hm it’s 3pm and I’ve been up since 11am doing nothing but read manga. Stumbled across three chapters of Deadman Wonderland earlier and it’s pretty promising. Typical shounen with the gore and accentuated physical features of the female characters (one of the main characters is a G cup, which would be an F in American size?), but really interesting premise. A teenage boy, Ganta, is sentenced to death row for a mass murder he didn’t commit. The prison he is sent to is an amusement park in post-earthquake Tokyo operated by the inmates. Of course there’s lot of secrets behind the theme park, the mass murder, Ganta’s old friend Shiro, and Ganta’s supernatural powers. Trust me, it’s more interesting than what my summary makes it out to be.
Edit: I love reading the small talk (side columns with the manga-ka’s ramblings) in mangas. In chapter 5 of PR, the manga-ka goes realizes that there’s a “high nude rate!!” lmao xD It’s typical of gender-bender mangas because:
- You are guaranteed that the character’s gender will be found out through being walked in on whilst changing
- They have to transform between genders, otherwise you won’t have masculine-looking male characters that female readers can salivate over
- It brings in the dough
Ah, I need to stop reading manga and go do something with my life O:)
Hanadan woes
A couple of days ago a friend, DH, asked me what dramas I was watching since I had mentioned that I like watching dramas. I said that there wasn’t anything lately that caught my attention, and so he said that he started watching one called Hana Yori Dango. First I was O_O then <333333333333333!! So I’ve been talking about the Hanadan jdrama with him lately. Ah, the magic of Veoh. Now I want to watch it again. I’ve already seen HYD at least 5 times, and HYD2 at least twice.
I’m going home this weekend. I’m coming back with my DVDs :D
I want to see the rain and elevator scenes again~ There is something so vulnerable and precious about those two scenes. And Matsumoto Jun is such an intense actor. He gives me the shivers watching him. The good kind. Really, no drama has gotten me to care so much about it and to think about its themes and characters’ problems so deeply. Coffee Prince is second, and Meteor Garden (so surprise there, it was my first drama and the Taiwainese version of Hanadan) ties with Nobuta wo Produce for third.
Old news to me, but… a Hanadan movie is coming out this year. YES. Please, come to my city? Or film it at my overpriced school with its gorgeous 200 year old architecture and regularly painted grass (money which came out of my “tuition”)?!
Okay, okay. Back to my paper now.
Did I mention how much I was (and still am) in love with Tsukushi-chan’s scarf in HYD?! The red-and-white thin striped scarf with tiny white pom-poms on it. I haven’t had any luck finding a scarf similar to that yet.. that would make a lovely Christmas present for next year :) lol♥
Why?!
“X has more hair on her legs than he does on his thighs!” – best quote from last night
So proud of myself still continuing to blog~ But that’s because I don’t want to do work right now and I should probably take another nap since I only slept 4 hours last night -______- I need to go eat dinner, but it’s raining/snowing here according to my roommate that just came back. Guess pretzels, cereal, and yogurt will just have to do since I’m not up to braving the elements tonight.
DBSK’S Purple Line is so lulz. So I’m listening along and thinking Niiiice, a sultry beginning, catchy beat and then I hear “just wanna touch myself.” WTF?! Random Engrish is hilarious. It’s like those shirts with FUCK or something equally obscene on them that Asian teens and celebs sometimes sport. Why don’t they know what it means?! And if it’s a celebrity, why did the stylist pick that?!?!
Well their T album seems pretty good so far after listening to some song previews (hooray for imeem!). Hero Jae Joong’s voice is gorgeous as always :) Okay, he’s just plain gorgeous.
I’ve been scouring YesStyle for a nice dress coat. Online shopping is awesome. The shipping costs are not =/ So even though I have a white jean jacket and a white poofy casual jacket (the one that makes me look like I’m still in high school *_*), I still want a white coat. I should probably get black, but there’s just something elegant, trendy, and innocent about a white coat =) And it’ll look lovely with the gorgeous sea foam green scarf I got for Christmas. My poor bookmark folder is full of too many coats that I like, haha. I still have maybe 200+ coats left to check out?? I bet that more was even added to the site since I last checked.. Definitely need to make time to look through the rest since I need the coat by next Saturday. Haven’t checked the shipping charges yet but I’m sure it’ll be outrageous for 1 or 2-day shipping. There goes the rest of my money after buying books… $300 was spent this time compared to about $600 last semester. Man, college is expensive!!
This is the one that gave me heart palpations. If it was in white, I would buy it in a heartbeat. Too bad it’s out now..
But this is nice. The white and black ones are especially nice:
I really need to do an eye exam so I can order more contacts. I’m using my last pair now and the ones from this brand tend to get very sticky and gross after the two-week period. Yesterday I called my mom to see if my dad’s insurance plan would cover it if I went. It used to be every 12 months I could go, but since the plan changed she didn’t know the details. So she told me to go buy this daily enzyme cleaner to make my contacts last longer -_-;; I went to CVS and spent $30 on that, more contact solution, and toothpaste.. but I got a mail-in coupon for free toothpaste so yay~
Hm guess I’ll get ready for my trek to the library. I like watching snow from inside, and not walking in it at night -o-
Edit: So Gong Yoo has left for the army like many Korean male celebs as of late. I love how he’s going with a smile and with much respect for his fans. Gong Yoo, I’ll finish the last 2 eps of Coffee Prince soon, I promise~
I will miss his wonderful hair.
Oh yay, a new blog..
I finally caved in and got a WordPress. Yes, another blog to my collection: tabulas, xanga, myspace, livejournal, vox, and my old self-hosted WordPress blog. I love blogging. I don’t care that most likely, no one is going to read it except for the few that happen to stumble across it randomly. But I do love writing and miss it so much :) It’s just that I would be so motivated to write everyday, and then the urge to write will wear off as life gets busy and I get lazy. So one of my new year’s resolutions this year like every year is to blog almost everyday. Because I love looking back on my old entries to see what excited me at the time, what frustrated me, and generally who I was. Blame the psychologist in me for enjoying self-analysis.
I’m definitely keeping my other blogs because they each have their own purposes (sentimental or practical). And I’ve always wanted to buy my own domain and host my own WordPress-powered blog (another new year’s resolution), but ehhh I’m a poor college student and so I’ll stick with this until then.
Although the default header image is gorgeous and soothing, I’m fighting the strong urge to procrastinate by creating my own. And I want to play around with the CSS. But life is calling. Gotta get back to outlining my personality psychology book =/ Only 40+ more pages to go, and I’m caught up for the week!
At least there’s ice cream in the fridge. It’s too bad though that I kicked my previously nice-looking phone off the desk in the process. But I’m pretty sure that the people on the 6th floor didn’t hear my screams of agony.
