Hikari

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I haven’t blooged because I’ve been feeling very depressed.  I had another breakdown on the 8th and the next day my dad made an appointment for me to see my nurse practitioner (person who perscribes my medication), but it’s not for another week.  I feel that I need stronger medication or a different medication.  I had been taking it consistantly,  but I still had problems.  And I noticed that I’m not catching on as easily in school, I just can’t seem to focus.  I think that’s another symptom of being bi-polar.  I feel a lot better now, but I still have to catch up on my school work.  Oh, and I withdrew from English…  I feel like I won’t accomplish anything in life, I can’t even keep a full course load.  I don’t know what to do…

Moving away from that, I made a subdomain for a rotation site.  Yes you can download the songs, but there are rules!  I don’t think anyone has found it yet, and there are no downloads…  It hasn’t even been a day, so I don’t know why I’m concerned about that.  I need to get a new layout up, because this one relys on image buttons that I can’t easily change.  So hopefully in the next week I can do that.

Hrm, what else?  A couple of my friends and I are going into Chicago to pick up tickets for the Dir en grey concert there.  We don’t know when, but at the same time, we’re going to go to Mitsuwa, again.  I really don’t have the money to spend, so I’m not exactly excited about that part.  But I’m looking forward to the concert.  A bit of a random jump, but my family is going out to dinner tonight.  No reason, but I’m happy about it.  This is shorter than my usual, but that’s all I have to say for right now.  See you later!

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Well, I had a near break down for no reason Wednesday night.  I just got depressed and anxious.  I’m still quite anxious, I feel like I’m paralyzed, backed into a corner and can’t do anything to get myself out of it.  I know what I can do, but I feel either too scared or too overwhelmed (I’m not sure which) to start.  So I’m blogging.  Won’t do anything for me, I know, but maybe it’ll take my mind off of it.

Ok, ended up going to Mitsuwa and my friends brothers b-day party.  Mitsuwa first.  We made it there in 2 hours!  I was excited!  Only one of my friends was able to make it, but it was still fun.  I got Momotaro (Peach Boy) in Japanese, b-day cards, a manga and a phone charm.  Then we went to the mall.  We didn’t have enough time to go to Sanrio, but I got a set of tea cups for Christmas!  They were half off too!  They have a sakura print on them and have a cream background.  My mom took them away because they’re for Christmas, so I can’t describe them further.  At the same place, I got a book of Japanese childrens stories.  We actually already have the book, but this one was in color, and I wanted my own copy.  Then we went back to Mitsuwa and ate lunch.  My mom did some shopping and I couldn’t find waht I was looking for.  That made me sad.  But I wanted to find more things to buy, but my friend had to go to work so we left.

Then, after we got back home, I went to visit a friend on campus and drop off a Doraemon (I think that’s how you spell it) pastery that we got at Mitsuwa for her.  I don’t know her too well, but we were, and are, in the same Japanese class.  And I’m horrible at making conversation so it was a bit akward.  Anyway, she liked it so that made me happy.  And she gave me cookies, which are great by the way, and that also made me happy.  Then I went to the b-day party.  And it was fun!  Lots of talking and joking.  And after, a handful of people went over to another friends house and we played Mao.  I don’t have a good handle on the game at all, so I won’t bother trying to explain it.  But it was fun.

Now, to the anxiety part.  I skipped like 4 classes this week.  And feel really guilty about it.  I think that’s part of why I’m anxious.  The rest is school work, I feel unprepared and behind.  I’m not that behind, I just feel that way.  And I joined and am secretary for the Japanese Martial Arts and Culture Club at my college.  I went to the first session last night and felt so akward!  I thought I felt akward in dance class in high school.  But this is worse.  I’m scared of hurting the person I’m working with because the techniques don’t rely on strength.  And I just feel akward moving my body.  So I hope I get more comfterable quickly, or I may have a panic attack before each session.  Oh, I also feel like I don’t know what I’m doing.

And I’ll really try and get a different layout up soon, I can’t stand this one!  I have one made up, I just have to code it.  But I’ve been really lazy lately so I don’t know if and when it will actually get up.  Well, I’ll try!

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Well I didn’t have to get up early this morning!  Yay for an extra hour of sleep!  Not much, but I couldn’t get back to sleep.  So my website hosting has been renewed, and I have a new layout!  I know, it sucks.  But I spent so much time making the buttons that I had to use it.  The only thing I do like about it is the color scheme.  But everything else is crap.  I had 2 major issues getting it to work.  1 was having an extra layer in there and the other was using a different style sheet for cutenews.  I felt so stupid.  Oh well, it’s fixed.

Random side note, my keyboard is making funny noises…  I want a new laptop!

Hrm, lets see…  Oh!  Guess what!  I was planning to cancel the deluxe edition of Uroboros because I didn’t do my research and I didn’t know what “LP” stood for.  Stupid me.  So now I can’t cancel it.  Wanna know why?  Too bad you’re going to hear it!  The credit card used for online purchases had unauthorized charges on it and my dad canceled the card before I could cancel the order.  The irony of it.  So now I’m stuck with 2 records…  I may try and sell them on e-bay.  But I’m keeping the extra DVD.  I hate myself sometimes.

And I bought my friends b-day presesnts!  And seeing that they don’t read this, there’s no harm in me revealing some details.  I’ll give a virtual cookie to whoever knows where the last half of the sentance came from.  I bought them small bottles and will fill them with stars.  It’s relativly rare to see stars where I live so it’s kinda special.  I know, I’m cheap.  But I would rather spend the money on family.  And speaking of b-days my friend’s brother is celebrating his 21st this Saturday.  And I really don’t want to spend the gas money and the money for food to celebrate with him.  It’s on the other side of town for me and I would rather be somewhere else.  So now that I’m thinking about it, maybe I could do 2 things.  I was going to bite the bullet and go, but I got excited about trying to find things at Mitsuwa.  So that’s waht I really want to do.  But that’s more of an all day thing.  But maybe, I could get away with doing both.  Just checked on the time for his party and I think I could do both!  I’ll check with my mom about times and such, because she’s coming with me for sure.  I really want to look for the milk syrup that goes on shave ice, salt ice cream, and other sweets!  So excited!  I doubt I’ll be able to find the milk syrup stuff, but that’s ok.  I have $10 worth of certificates I can spend!  Whee!  I’m getting something from the book store, maybe a childrens book?  And maybe we can stop by the mall, they have a sanrio store and a tea pot/cup store!  Excitment!  Ok, I’ll shut up now…

And just as another side note, this blog post is almost as long as my paper for English…  Short about 50 words or so.

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Gah!  I hate it!  I have almost zero free time!  So the first 2 weeks I worked hard, went to class and did everything I was supossed to do.  I was burnt out last week so I skipped an entire week of business classes.  I feel better this week, but I have the second draft of a paper due the 17th and a quiz tomorrow, and probably an exam Thursday.  So yeah.  I’m giving myself some free time back!  I’m getting back into Fiesta (mmorpg), and watched the first 2 episodes of Higurashi no Naku Koro ni.  And now I’m blogging.  I feel better already.

So Tuesdays and Thursdays I’m entirely burnt out.  I have 3 classes and am at school for 9 hours (although I’m not in class all 9 hours) and it’s draining.  But on Mondays and Wednesdays, I only have 1 class, yay!  And I have the rest of the day for homework for my Tues. and Thurs. classes…  -.-  Sometimes I do a lot, sometimes I do a little, depends on my mood.  I still have to read 2 more chapters for business, study for that exam and for a quiz.  So today I didn’t do much.  Oh!  But Chinese, the prof doesn’t really teach.  It’s driving me mental!  All he does is have us pronounce things and go over a couple culture points that we’re going to forget in a half an hour!  It’s a language class, and I think he’s trying to do too much.  We don’t practice gramar, hardly touch words and their meaning and we don’t practice the characters.  He just emphasized the numbers (which, thankfully, I know from Japanese) and said we will be using them soon.  Oh, and my Japanese sensei is in the class too.  She makes things interesting, like making hime explain things over and over.  My friend and I think it’s funny.  So, in conclusion, that class terrifies me just because I don’t feel like I know anything.  So, I’m going to do some research on language learning programs.

What else is new…  Oh, I got my b-day pressesnts over the weekend!  Yami no Kuni no Alice by D and Glass Skin by Dir en grey!  I’ve listened to pat of D’s single and Asagi’s singing style sounds different.  Less operatic maybe?  And I haven’t had a chance to listen to Deg yet, my laptop refuses to recognize CDs.  Makes me mad!  And I just pre-ordered Deg’s Uroboros.  The limited edition one.  Yeah, I feel stupid.  I figured shipping to be $20, nope.  More like $35.  Grand total (with about $2 of points factored in (every little bit helps!)) of $143.72.  And with the stock market falling, I feel even more stupid.

Once again, I have been meaning to work on this site!  Hosting should auto renew.  Anyway, I still need to add a gallery, finish up zodiac info, and rotate the media player.  I need a check list or something.  And a new layout.  So hopefully that will happen soon!

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♥Plug: Brigitte

First off, thanks for the comment and the follow Brigitte!  So everyone (I hear crickets chirping…) visit her blog!  I like her writing style and layout!

Alright!  We did end up getting DSL.  And I finally figured out why my parent’s computer couldn’t get online.  Basically, Windows Firewall is nonexistant so there’s no way to configure a connection.  I think.  I tried the fixes on Microsoft’s website and none of them worked.  So I want them to get a new computer.  Oh and I forgot to mention, my dad bought like 2 or 3 security softwares and he can’t find ANY of them.  So I got a free one off of my college’s website and there’s a trojan on the computer.  I tried to remove it, but I don’t know if it worked or not.  That’s why I want them to get a new computer, plus it runs slow.  And I am tired because I stayed up untill 2 trying to figure out and fix the problem >.<

Other than that, I found out I have a class off campus.  I didn’t realize it was when I registered for it, but according to my mom, it should be closer.  And, fortunately, I have no other classes that day so I don’t have to rush form one area to another.

That’s it, I may edit this when I’m more awake.  I really should get more about Japan done…

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Where to begin?  Well, a couple weeks ago my dad decided to get DSL.  We’re going thorough AT&T because we already have their home phone service, but we needed to change phone plans to get DSL.  After a week, we tried again because the person we spoke with has gotten other people DSL with our phone plan.  So they finally got the order in for it and it was supossed to be hooked up last Thursday.  Well the order didn’t clear so it’s supossed to be hooked up today.  So I’m waiting for that.  That’s what is imedietely on my mind.

Other than that, I’m tired for no reason, so the rest of this may be a bit jumbled.  Amanda left for college Sunday.  And so far, it hasn’t sunk in that she’ll be gone for 4 months.  It just seems like she’ll be back in a week or so.  Before she left, she got into a relationship with a guy an hour or so away.  Not the guy she met in the previous post.  She broke it off with him.  So I’m kinda worried about the relationship, if it’s going to last or not.  But whatever, it’s her life.

So, website.  I’ve been obsessed with doing things with my site, I’m starting a gallery and adding more to my playlist and I hope to get up a list of my mangas.  Finally updared Wordpress, and I found a different layout for the blog, as you noticed.  Also added content to the About Me page.  But I was working on a new layout, and got most of it done, but then ran out of ideas.  So I’ll just keep it if I need it.

Yesterday I picked up my books for school with my dad.  I’m retaking Business and English so I already had those books, and am trying Chinese and continuing Japanese.  So a full load.  I’m slightly scared.  The 2 previous times I tried a full load, I either failed or withdrew.  So I’m going to try and not to procastinate or get distracted.  Classes start the 25th so just keep that in mind, I may blog less and less as the semester goes on.  Wish me luck!

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I’ll try and go in order.  My birthday was 2 weeks ago and we went to ESPN Zone for lunch!  I had this giant cookie dessert and it was the best!  Then we went to Mitsuwa and picked up a bunch of Milk and Coffee drinks.  I made 20, so 1 more year till I can leagally drink!  Parents still need to order my gift though…

After that, I was working on my dress for the convention and barely got it done.  I didn’t get the lace on but the dress was done.  My friend’s mom drove us and I had never seen her so pissed!  There was this guy going about 10 under the speed limit and she was yelling at him and honking!  It wasn’t on a free way so she couldn’t pass him.  I understand where she’s coming from, but there’s nothing you can do about it.  So we got there and the con wasn’t interesting.  So we hung out with my friend’s sister in law.  She had a booth in artist’s alley.  Not much to do.  But going out to get dinner one evening there was this creepy guy who was curious about what was on my shirt.  I was going to keep walking, but my friend stopped to hear what he wanted.  I slowed and humored her.  But after I was like “ok, that was creepy.”

So the tea party rolls around and my dress didn’t fit.  It was about a size too big.  So I didn’t wear it.  I was a bit upset, but what can you do?  The tea party was fun at least.  Bingo and cookies and tea.  And prizes where most of her helpers won something…  Including me…  I felt kinda bad.  But after the tea party, the same creepy guy came up to us and started talking.  I fell back so I didn’t hear much of the conversation.  Bu my friend was the only one talking to him.  Ends up he “though all three of you are very cute.”  That was it and we went our separte ways.  Now I’m thinking, my friend is an idiot.  You ignore them and keep walking.  So I was a bit mad.  The rest of the con went off without a hitch, for the most part.

Moving on, my mom and sister went to LA for my sister’s orientation.  So my dad and I were here by ourselves.  Kinda nice, I had the house to myself most of the time.  And last Friday we (my mom and I) went to Mitsuwa again because of Okinawan doughnuts.  The weren’t very good.  But we made the trip well worth it, bought a lot of stuff.  And I filled up my Sanseido card and got $10 in certificates.  Yay!

Same day, my sister, Amanda, went out to go to a guy’s house who she met online.  She didn’t tell me, but she told my mom.  And then my mom came to talk to me about it and when she told me where Amanda was going, I freaked out.  I was thinking “is she a complete idiot?!”  So I called her, freaked out on her, and made her meet him somewhere else.  So the next day we go out shopping, I apologized for freaking out on her, and she tells me that mom was ok with her going to his house.  And I was like “what?”  So I need to talk to my mom about that.  So I kinda feel bad about freaking out on my sister, but still, what was she thinking?!

No Japan section, this is long enough as it is.

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No Japan posting tonight, too tired and down.  So I was talking to the friend that wants people to go to the con with her last night.  And found out it was going to be really cheap to stay overnight so I implied that I was going to go.  And I am regreting it a bit right now.  I’m not interested in anime that much any more and lack a job so I don’t want to go.  But her brother’s wife is having this lolita tea party that I really want to go to.  But I’ll need a dress and those things are expensive!  And I only have so much money.  I looked into making one myself, but I figured the amount I would save (which isn’t much) wouldn’t be worth the work.  I’ve only sewn one thing before and it was simple so I didn’t screw it up.  But still, I’m scared of the sewing machine.  So it will cost about $150 with shipping for a dress.  But I don’t know if I’ll need a petticoat (sp?) to make it poofy.  And that would be another $30.  So I don’t want to disapoint my friend, because she kinda needs a ride, but I don’t want to owe my parents money.  Gah!  Stupid thing to get depressed over, I know.  So I’ll just shut up about that now.

But I was looking into KinKi Kids and was trying to listen to their entire discography.  Let me explain first.  In the Japanese culture class I’m taking, we have to do a project for the mid-term and it can be any part of Japanese culture.  We can have groups and seeing that my friend (different from the anime convention one) loves j-pop and I did my senior exit project on j-rock, I figured why not do j-pop?  So we’re focusing on Johnny’s Entertainment.  And she knows the majority of their groups and projects and all this other stuff I don’t.  But there were 2 groups neither of us knew much about: Arashi and KinKi Kids.  Because we’re putting together a video of PVs and need clips from them.  So I picked KinKi Kids to figure out their most unique/well known song.  I can’t stand them.  So mello and boring.  So I’m going to see if we can just cut them out.  I couldn’t even figure out what is popular because all of their singles hit no. 1.  Gah!  …Again.

So while I was looking into KinKi Kids, don’t ask how I just clicked a link, I came across Bunraku.  The movie.  I laughed so hard!  About samurai Gackt (I still have to watch Fuurin Kazan) and other matial arts sounding stuff.  If you didn’t already know, bunraku is Japanese puppet drama.  I mean, whoever is making this movie probably has that play in.  Like someone is controling other people from behind the sceens.  I still think it’s rediculous though.

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Misc. Stuff

Made pizza from psudo scratch.  I just didn’t make the sauce.  It turned out better than last time because the dough actually rose.  Yeah, my life is boring right now.  Still kinda depressed but am getting over it.  But I’m procrasinating homework from that Japanese Culture class.  It’s not that it’s hard, it’s just time consuming, taking notes over stuff that can be described in a couple words.  Anyway, we went to Chicago on Saturday to meet my cousins.  It was great to see them again!  Went to the Adler Planitarium, which would have been interesting if I would have been more awake.  My cousin loves astronomy.  Went to the Taste and it was murder getting around around dinner time.  If there are tons of people, I really don’t enjoy myself.

What else?  My friend is going to an anime convention and may need someone to drive.  So she asked a few of us if we were interested in going.  Cost and interest are the main problems for me.  I would love to go on a road trip with friends, but I am not as interested in anime as I once was.  Plus, I really don’t want to pay for a hotel room.  Moving on to more interesting material.

Japan Part 1 (Pre-Japan)

To start, all of us got 3-5 hours of sleep the night/morning before we had to leave.  Brilliant, ne?  So we left at around 6 AM and my dad drove to Chicago.  Flew out to LA and durring the flight, my dad realized that the plane we were going to take to Narita would begin boarding before we landed.  So, like all people on all flights, everyone stands up as soon as, if not before, the seatbelt light is turned off.  Needless to say, it took forever to de-plane.  And luckily for us, the plane that was going to send us to Narita had mechanical problems so we had to wait 4 hours for one from London.

Fianally we’re on our way!  And if you have to fly, fly international.  To Japan we took American Airlines and we got 2 meals, 1 snack, and a nice selection of movies, videos, and music to entertain you.  And for people like me, who don’t like watching TV/movies and prefer to listen to their own music, the screen shows how far away your destination is.

So we land in Narita, go through customs and hop on a bus to take us to the hotel.  It took over an hour to get to Ikebukuro.

Seeing that this is getting long, I’m going to end it there.  I’ll cover Tokyo next post.

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Frist off, it was an amazing, fun, and fast paced trip.  Second, I want to go back.  Third, I’m depressed because of multiple things.  As I need to get some emotions out, this will not be about my trip.  And there’s so much to write about I’ll have to do it in pieces.  So just telling you now that this will be about what’s making me depressed.

The first thing that’s making me depressed is I don’t see myself ever going back to Japan.  Mainly because I don’t have the GPA to do study abroad and how expensive it is to live there.  I really want to go back because I loved it there.  The people were so nice and helpful, public transportation is easy and most things are within walking distance from a train station or bus stop, it’s so clean, and the atmosphere felt right to me.

The next thing that’s making me depressed is my friends.  There was a get together at one of their houses and whenever Japan came up, all one of them could talk about is how he was going to spend 2 semesters in Japan with a school that he’s not even accepted to yet.  That seriously pissed me off.  Not only that, but he is so self centered and all he does is toot his own horn.  Another thing is no one really asked me about my trip.  It was basically “how was it?  That’s nice.”  Made me sad.

The third thing that’s making me depressed is my computer stopped playing CDs.  It will play DVDs though and I just got off the phone with my uncle and he told me to try a couple things so I’m going to end it here.  Thanks for reading.